The Total Economic Impact™ Of Microsoft 365 E3

The Combined Cost Savings And Business Benefits Enabled By Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, And Microsoft 365 Copilot

A Forrester Total Economic Impact™ Study Commissioned By Microsoft, January 2025

Microsoft 365 E3 allows organizations to drive cost savings, improve user and IT productivity, facilitate user collaboration across hybrid working models, and take advantage of AI capabilities. Adopting Microsoft 365 E3 along with Microsoft Teams and Microsoft 365 Copilot allows organizations to further reduce licensing and infrastructure costs while also decreasing IT support costs, improving security posture, and positioning users to take advantage of AI solutions now and in the future.

Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to conduct a Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study and examine the potential return on investment (ROI) enterprises may realize by deploying Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft 365 Copilot.1 The purpose of this study is to provide readers with a framework to evaluate the potential financial impact of these Microsoft solutions on their organizations.

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Return on investment (ROI)

197%197%

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Net present value (NPV)

$101.6M$101.6M

To better understand the benefits, costs, and risks associated with this investment, Forrester interviewed five decision-makers and conducted a survey of 269 respondents with experience using Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft 365 Copilot at their organizations. For the purposes of this study, Forrester aggregated the interviewees’ experiences and combined the results into a single composite organization that is an industry-agnostic organization with $10 billion annual revenue and 30,000 employees.

is an organization with in annual revenue and 0 Microsoft 365 users. 0% of these users will have a Microsoft 365 Copilot license. Microsoft Teams is not included in this analysis.Microsoft Teams is also included in this analysis. Custom results are based on user inputs and the TEI case study.

Prior to using Microsoft 365 E3 and Microsoft Teams, most interviewees’ organizations maintained a hybrid environment with Microsoft Office (Microsoft 365 apps) and on-premises deployments. These organizations relied on third-party tools and vendors for communication, file sharing, and device management solutions. Managing these environments required significant IT staff hours, relationships with several vendors, and capex budgets for upgrades or user expansion. User-to-user collaboration was inconsistent, and disconnected solutions made file sharing, collaboration, and meetings a mixed experience. Interviewed decision-makers hoped that moving to the cloud and consolidating their organization’s solution sets would reduce costs, free IT resources to focus on more important tasks, and improve user collaboration to support hybrid working models. Taking advantage of AI solutions was impossible for several of the interviewees’ organizations due to disconnected solutions and siloed data across their solution landscapes.

By adopting Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and eventually Microsoft 365 Copilot, the interviewees’ and survey respondents’ organizations were able to retire on-premises, redundant applications, which freed up IT resources and reduced infrastructure and licensing costs. The new features and functionality of Microsoft 365 E3 made it easier for IT teams to manage their environments, while users gained access to a suite of solutions that enabled collaboration across hybrid working models. Users in roles suitable for AI assistance gained additional productivity benefits from Microsoft 365 Copilot.

Key Findings

Quantified benefits. Three-year, risk-adjusted present value (PV) quantified benefits for the composite organization include:

  • Vendor consolidation savings of $60 per user per month. The composite organization consolidates its user applications under Microsoft 365 E3 and Microsoft Teams. This consolidation enables it to eliminate redundant licenses for communication, collaboration, file sharing, endpoint management, email, storage, mobile device management, identity and access management, information encryption and labeling, and endpoint protection. The composite also retires related infrastructure supporting legacy on-premises solutions.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

  • End-user device savings on 3,000 devices. With Microsoft 365 E3 providing more robust device management tools, the composite organization can transition some employees to a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) model and retire corporate devices. The composite organization recognizes savings in devices, wireless plans, back-office invoicing, and vendor management.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

  • Endpoint deployment and management time savings of over 25,000 hours (or 12 FTEs). Endpoint management tools on Microsoft 365 E3, including Windows Autopilot, Windows Autopatch, and Microsoft Intune, as well as a simplified application stack, lead to less “commodity IT” work required of the composite organization’s IT teams. These teams now have the flexibility to transition to more strategic IT work supporting the business.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

  • Reduction in support tickets by 45% and improved resolution times by 21%. The composite experiences more consistent application updates and more efficient software deployments, contributing to fewer application or system errors and reducing the number of support tickets. Baseline security from Microsoft Defender for Endpoint P1 also reduces the likelihood of malware-related support tickets, while the ability to build corporate intranets with SharePoint Online provides users at the composite organization with self-service solutions to common problems.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

  • End-user productivity savings of more than 70 hours per year. The composite organization’s end users become more productive by combining the communication and collaboration features of Microsoft Teams with the collaboration and document sharing capabilities of Microsoft 365 apps, OneDrive for Business, and SharePoint Online. Entra ID single sign-on (SSO) facilitates frictionless access to applications across the Microsoft platform.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

  • Productivity savings of 108 hours per year for Microsoft 365 Copilot users. Microsoft 365 Copilot users at the composite organization take advantage of features such as meeting transcription and summarizations, content creation assistance, and the ability to find information (and derive insights) faster to gain additional productivity in their roles across Microsoft 365 applications.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

  • Travel and expense reduction of 20%. The composite organization saves money on airfare, meals, insurance, and other costs related to employee travel by shifting from in-person meetings and activities to remote meetings and effective collaboration made possible by Microsoft Teams and Microsoft 365 E3 applications.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

  • Security breach impact reduction. Microsoft 365 E3 provides the composite organization with security tools that reduce the likelihood and impact of security breaches. Access management tools such as Entra ID P1 secure remote work, while Microsoft Purview Information Protection P1 offers a first line of defense for information protection. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint P1 offers attack surface protection at the endpoint level.

For , this benefit might be worth over three years.

Unquantified benefits. Benefits that provide value for the composite organization but are not quantified for this study include:

  • Enhanced business outcomes from AI-aided work. While the productivity benefits of Microsoft 365 Copilot have been quantified for this study, interviewees ultimately noted that work completed with Copilot may result in better business outcomes from Copilot’s improvements to the speed and quality of AI-aided decisions.
  • Improved security posture with Microsoft. Windows 11 Enterprise has several advanced security features to help the composite organization combat malware. Organizations using Windows 11 security features instead of third-party point solutions or legacy versions of Windows expect improved system resource usage and device performance. Interviewees also expressed confidence in their ability on the Microsoft platform to keep their data secure while using AI models and applications.
  • Advanced scalability to transition capex to opex. Microsoft 365 E3 is a pure software-as-a-service (SaaS) offering, affording the composite organization the flexibility to scale deployments without major investments in support hardware or upfront licensing. Organizations pay a monthly per user fee instead of purchasing an up-front license and can easily scale by adding more licenses without investing in support infrastructure.

Costs. Three-year, risk-adjusted PV costs for the composite organization include:

  • Initial implementation and planning costs of $3.3 million. The composite organization dedicates internal resources to migrate existing applications to the cloud and implement new features offered by Microsoft 365 E3. The organization works with a Microsoft partner who creates a project roadmap, assists with implementation and migration efforts, and creates adoption and change management materials. Microsoft’s FastTrack Center provides remote, expert guidance from Microsoft engineers to the composite organization at no additional cost.

For , these costs could represent over three years.

  • Microsoft licensing costs of $37.6 million. The composite organization pays Microsoft licensing fees per user per month across its end users. Microsoft 365 E3 and Microsoft Teams are licensed for all 30,000 users at $33.75 and $5.25 per user per month, respectively, while Microsoft 365 Copilot is licensed at $30 per user per month for 3,000 users.

For , these costs could represent over three years.

  • Ongoing management costs of $8.1 million. The composite organization incurs labor costs for internal resources managing its deployment.

For , these costs could represent over three years.

  • End-user training costs of $1.2 million. The composite organization trains its existing users on new features and functionality, and it trains new hires annually.

For , these costs could represent over three years.

  • Device refresh costs of $1.3 million. The composite organization adopts modern endpoint management principles as part of its Microsoft 365 E3 rollout. As part of this shift, the organization shortens its device refresh cycle, providing newer devices to users more often.

For , these costs could represent over three years.

The representative interviews, survey, and financial analysis found that a composite organization experiences benefits of $153.21 million over three years versus costs of $51.65 million, adding up to a net present value (NPV) of $101.56 million and an ROI of 197%.

might experience benefits of over three years versus costs of , adding up to an NPV of and an ROI of .

Annual user productivity savings

70 hours

“[With Microsoft 365 E3], we can deploy our resources on our own applications that need care and development versus the more ‘commodity IT’ stuff.”

Vice president of IT, energy

Key Statistics

  • icon icon

    Return on investment (ROI)

    197%197%
  • icon icon

    Benefits PV

    $153.2M$153.2M
  • icon icon

    Net present value (NPV)

    $101.6M$101.6M
  • icon icon

    Payback

    <6 months<6 months
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  • icon icon
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Benefits (Three-Year)

Vendor consolidation savings End-user device savings Endpoint deployment and management time savings IT administration and help desk savings End-user productivity improvements Additional user productivity improvments from Microsoft 365 Copilot Reduced travel and expense Reduced impact of security breaches

TEI Framework And Methodology

From the information provided in the interviews, Forrester constructed a Total Economic Impact™ framework for those organizations considering an investment in Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft 365 Copilot.

The objective of the framework is to identify the cost, benefit, flexibility, and risk factors that affect the investment decision. Forrester took a multistep approach to evaluate the impact that an investment in these Microsoft solutions can have on an organization.

  1. Due Diligence

    Interviewed Microsoft stakeholders and Forrester analysts to gather data relative to Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft 365 Copilot.

  2. Interviews and Survey

    Interviewed five decision-makers and conducted a survey of 269 respondents at organizations using Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft 365 Copilot to obtain data about costs, benefits, and risks.

  3. Composite Organization

    Designed a composite organization based on characteristics of the interviewees’ organizations.

  4. Financial Model Framework

    Constructed a financial model representative of the interviews using the TEI methodology and risk-adjusted the financial model based on issues and concerns of the interviewees.

  5. Case Study

    Employed four fundamental elements of TEI in modeling the investment impact: benefits, costs, flexibility, and risks. Given the increasing sophistication of ROI analyses related to IT investments, Forrester’s TEI methodology provides a complete picture of the total economic impact of purchase decisions. Please see Appendix A for additional information on the TEI methodology.

Disclosures

Readers should be aware of the following:

This study is commissioned by Microsoft and delivered by Forrester Consulting. It is not meant to be used as a competitive analysis.

Forrester makes no assumptions as to the potential ROI that other organizations will receive. Forrester strongly advises that readers use their own estimates within the framework provided in the study to determine the appropriateness of an investment in Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft 365 Copilot. For the interactive functionality using Configure Data/Custom Data, the intent is for the questions to solicit inputs specific to a prospect's business. Forrester believes that this analysis is representative of what companies may achieve with Microsoft 365 E3, Microsoft Teams, and Microsoft 365 Copilot based on the inputs provided and any assumptions made. Forrester does not endorse Microsoft or its offerings. Although great care has been taken to ensure the accuracy and completeness of this model, Microsoft and Forrester Research are unable to accept any legal responsibility for any actions taken on the basis of the information contained herein. The interactive tool is provided ‘AS IS,’ and Forrester and Microsoft make no warranties of any kind.

Microsoft reviewed and provided feedback to Forrester, but Forrester maintains editorial control over the study and its findings and does not accept changes to the study that contradict Forrester’s findings or obscure the meaning of the study.

Microsoft provided the customer names for the interviews but did not participate in the interviews.

Consulting Team:

Richard Cavallaro

Vanessa Fabrizio

M
K

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