The Total Economic Impact™ Of Revenera

Increased Revenue From Software Monetization Model Modernization

Evidence and data. Interviewees shared that Revenera’s software monetization and licensing management tools were key to facilitating their organizations’ shift away from traditional, perpetual licensing models to subscription-based models. Through this transition, organizations unlocked more predictable and frequent revenue streams. Rather than relying on one-time license sales, organizations were able to roll out recurring software monetization models that were better aligned with market trends and customer usage patterns without having to rebuild their internal systems. This move helped modernize their monetization approach and paved the way for scalable, long-term growth.
 

• The director of R&D in engineering technology explained how Revenera’s software monetization and licensing management capabilities have supported their efforts to grow ARR by introducing flexible pricing models that better serve different customer segments: “In an effort to increase our annual recurring revenue, we’ve introduced new recurring pricing models and encouraged people to migrate over time. In some cases, we keep both models available for our larger customers because their sales cycles tend to be several years long, and changing licensing models abruptly is challenging.”
  
  The director of R&D continued: “We’ve also been able to introduce usage-based licensing to capture more small and medium-sized businesses, where the barrier to entry for traditional models is sometimes too high. If they are hesitant to commit to a long-term purchase, we can now introduce a usage-based product, which is a smaller commitment.”
   

• The product manager in manufacturing said: “Before implementing Revenera, we didn’t have any mechanisms in place to offer subscription-based licensing. Since rolling it out, we’ve started transitioning our multimillion-dollar line of business to renewable subscriptions. Since we’ve been able to automate invoicing and order management, we can now offer subscription-based licensing in ways we couldn’t before.”
   
• The director of digital operations in energy shared: “We are actively working to shift more of our on-premises offerings to a subscription model through Revenera. Not only does this transition benefit our business by allowing us to bring in more recurring revenue, but it also allows us to host the solution ourselves, so our customer doesn’t need to have their own infrastructure. It’s a win-win.”
   

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite organization generates $2 billion in annual revenue, with a 10% year-over-year growth rate.
• Software products comprise 75% of the composite’s revenue.
• Fifteen percent of the composite’s software is on-premises.
• Ten percent of the composite’s software revenue is generated through perpetual licensing.
• With Revenera, the composite transitions 30% of its perpetual licensing revenue to subscription-based licensing in Year 1, 50% in Year 2, and 70% in Year 3.
• The composite’s operating margin is 15%.

Risks. This benefit will vary among organizations based on:

• Annual revenue and growth rate.
• Average percentage of revenue derived from software products.
• Average percentage of software that is on-premises.
• Average percentage of software revenue that is generated through perpetual licensing.
• Average percentage of perpetual licensing revenue transitioned to subscription-based licensing with Revenera.
• Operating margin.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $3.9 million.

Increased Revenue From Improved Compliance And Streamlined Operations

Evidence and data. Before implementing Revenera, interviewees reported significant revenue leakage due to various forms of license noncompliance — including piracy, underreported usage, and misuse of entitlements — and ineffective license tracking. Interviewees’ organizations struggled with limited visibility into software usage and license compliance and often relied on manual reviews that only surfaced major discrepancies during renewals — leaving smaller, persistent revenue drains unnoticed. Customers exceeding their paid entitlements or using demo versions beyond the allotted period frequently slipped through the cracks.
 

Revenera’s Compliance Intelligence, Entitlement Management, and Software Licensing solutions provided real-time insights into software usage, enabling organizations to detect noncompliance, enforce proper entitlement usage, and ensure effective license tracking and management earlier and with greater confidence. This visibility helped organizations close revenue gaps by identifying misuse and enforcing license agreements before losses escalated. Interviewees also shared that receiving license expiry notifications and leveraging automated entitlement enforcement helped prevent revenue loss by ensuring timely renewals and proactive compliance without disrupting customer relationships.
 

• The director of R&D in engineering technology said: “We’ve integrated Revenera into our financial system, so everything from royalty reporting to usage-based licensing and entitlement management is now streamlined. This gives us better visibility into who we’ve given licenses to, so we can track whether customers have more licenses than they’ve paid for. We’ve been able to recover a lot of revenue from overprovisioned licenses that would’ve otherwise gone unnoticed.”
  
  The VP of product in cybersecurity shared: “Historically, we did not pursue customers who were slightly overprovisioned unless it was a gross overuse case. We often waited until renewal cycles to address discrepancies. However, Revenera gives us the capability to track software usage with more precision, particularly for term licenses, and decide when and how to take action. The data it provides allows us to evaluate and take action with more confidence should we need to enforce overprovisioning penalties.”
  
  The VP of product continued: “We plan to use [Revenera] to introduce workflows for license expiry notifications to give customers proactive reminders when they’ve exceeded entitlements or when their licenses have expired. The goal is to help keep honest customers honest and maintain compliance without being overly aggressive.”
  
  The VP of product concluded: “While we haven’t enforced over-provisioning restrictions yet, Revenera gives us the capability to do so if needed. This allows us to be more intentional about compliance. We want to strike the right balance between revenue protection and customer experience.”
   

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• The composite organization generates 90% of its software revenue from subscription-based licensing.
• Before Revenera, the composite loses 4% of revenue each year due to noncompliance and ineffective license tracking.
• The composite’s operating margin is 15%.

Risks. This benefit will vary among organizations based on:

• Revenue derived from software products.
• Average percentage of software revenue derived from subscription-based licensing.
• Average percentage of revenue lost due to noncompliance and ineffective license tracking before Revenera.
• Operating margin.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 15%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $18.8 million.

Accelerated Time To Market

Evidence and data. Before Revenera, interviewees’ organizations faced significant delays in enabling licensing and entitlement before releasing new software products to the market. These delays created bottlenecks, where products were ready but remained unsellable due to the time-consuming process of defining, generating, and enabling software licenses and entitlements. In some cases, organizations even had to delay product launches or abandon planned releases altogether because of the slow pace of licensing integrations. Organizations often spent months on manual integrations with order management systems, front-end interface development, and the creation of administrative tools for license management.
 

These inefficiencies slowed product launches, delayed revenue generation, and hindered businesses from quickly capitalizing on market demand. With Revenera’s automated software licensing and entitlement management, organizations were able to accelerate time to market by streamlining these previously manual processes. This allowed them to generate revenue sooner, respond to customer demands faster, and maintain a competitive edge in their industry.
 

• The product manager in manufacturing said: “Implementing licensing and entitlement systems for new products could take over a year [in the prior environment]. We had to figure out how to integrate with order management systems, build a front-end interface, and create an administrative tool for managing licenses. Although the overall project may span several months with different components occurring at different times, the time required to enable licensing and entitlement now takes only one month.”
  
  The product manager continued: “The value here is clear: We’re able to do in a month what used to take over a year. Now, when we onboard a new product, it’s just a small portion of our standard work process, rather than a major challenge that we need to figure out. Previously, this was considered a high-risk area of our development process, but now, it’s a well-established part of each project. It means we can launch new products faster.”
  
  The product manager concluded: “Before Revenera, we would have had to wire things together, test in production and QA, and verify that the new license worked, which was a much more complex and time-consuming process. Now, for products that are already onboarded and have their licensing and entitlement systems set up in Revenera, adding a new license takes just a few minutes. You simply open Revenera, enter the new SKU, and it’s done. Of course, there are additional steps, like updating our ERP system, but overall, the time required is drastically reduced compared to before.”
  
   

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• Ten percent of the composite organization’s software revenue is attributable to new software development, rather than recurring revenue.
• The composite releases 0.5 new software products per year, or one new product every two years.
• Before Revenera, it takes the composite 160 hours each year to enable licensing and entitlement.
• With Revenera, the composite experiences an 80% reduction in time to enable licensing and entitlement.
• The composite’s operating margin is 15%.

Risks. This benefit will vary among organizations based on:

• Average percentage of software revenue is attributable to new software development, rather than recurring revenue.
• Frequency of software product releases with licensing and entitlement management enabled by Revenera.
• Time to enable licensing and entitlement before Revenera.
• Operating margin.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 20%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $10.4 million.

End-User Efficiencies

Evidence and data. Interviewees’ organizations reported significant efficiency gains for their IT support, customer support, and developer teams after implementing Revenera. They shared the following regarding the impact on each role:
 

• IT support savings. Before implementing Revenera, interviewees shared that their organizations’ IT support teams allocated significant time to fulfilling requests from sales and service teams to pull customer entitlement data. These requests often required manual searches across multiple systems, including CRMs, spreadsheets, and internal databases. With Revenera’s self-service capabilities, sales and support teams were able to independently access entitlement data through a centralized platform, allowing IT support resources to spend less time handling routine data requests and more time on strategic initiatives.
   
  • The director of digital operations in energy explained: “Our sales, commercial, and service people now have access to [Revenera’s Entitlement Management solution], so they can look up customer data on their own. They no longer have to reach out to tech support for questions about what exists once they have access. Because this has made us much more efficient, we’ve continued to put effort into educating teams on how to access Revenera on their own, so they don’t have to refer to a spreadsheet or call somebody.”
     
• Customer support savings. Interviewees explained that their customer support teams previously had to manually gather customer entitlement data from multiple sources, such as CRMs, spreadsheets, and IT systems, to effectively engage with customers. This process was time-consuming and often resulted in delayed responses to customer inquiries. With Revenera, all customer licensing information was consolidated into a single platform, so customer support agents could quickly access the information they needed to respond to customer queries in real time. This streamlined access significantly reduced time spent searching for data and improved their overall efficiency.
   
  • The product manager in manufacturing shared that instead of spending 2 hours per customer call tracking down license information across teams and systems, the customer support team now gets an instant report with Revenera. They said: “Before implementing Revenera, it was difficult for customer support teams to quickly identify which licenses a customer had. To gather that information, they would need to reach out to multiple teams across different business units to ask about the customer’s products. They would also have to go into CRMs and spreadsheets, or ask IT for an audit report, but there was no centralized system. Now, with Revenera, the customer support team can instantly access a clear snapshot of what licenses a customer has, whether active or expired, without having to search through multiple systems.”
     

• Developer savings. Before Revenera, interviewees’ organizations allocated developers to custom development for entitlement management in complex in-house systems. These tasks, which involved continuous updates, bug fixes, and bespoke coding, diverted their focus from core activities like product development and business innovation. By implementing Revenera, organizations automated entitlement management and eliminated the need for custom code development and manual system updates.
   
  • The VP of product in cybersecurity said that prior to Revenera, they would have between 10 to 12 developers dedicated to custom code development and managing the entitlement system. Reflecting on the effort required from these developers in the prior environment, they said: “If [our developers] weren’t working on keeping the system running, they were trying to implement changes, which was particularly difficult because of how complex our system was. Now, those developers are focused on more important tasks. We have four or five people still working with the entitlement system, but most of their time is spent adding reporting capabilities or exploring new ways to enhance our business operations. We’re looking at new features, capabilities, and ways to improve our go-to-market strategy.”
    
    The product manager in manufacturing said: “When we talked to different business units within our organization about implementing on Revenera, we sometimes faced the question: ‘Why can’t we just do this on our own? Why can’t we just publish our own web pages to activate products?’ The answer was that the costs, both in terms of headcount and infrastructure, would be significant. Having multiple products — with different ways to build and manage them and various systems to support each one — adds up quickly. Even if some of them shared the same platform, we’d still have to build and manage several systems on our own. With Revenera, we’ve been able to reduce that complexity from many different methods down to just one or two.”
    
    The product manager continued: “Building our own license management tool in-house would require a five- to 10-person development team just to build and maintain it. Our contract with Revenera is significantly less than the cost of doing it internally. Along with the cost savings, our Revenera contract gives us the flexibility to scale up to tens of millions in tiered licenses, which is something our in-house infrastructure simply wouldn’t be able to support.”
    
    The product manager concluded: “Arguably one of the biggest advantages for us is that we no longer need to build, maintain, and support the integrations with our ERP systems and other business applications. Revenera allows us to avoid repeated integration efforts across different divisions using the system. That’s huge for us.”
    
     

Modeling and assumptions. Based on the interviews, Forrester assumes the following about the composite organization:

• IT support savings:
  • The composite organization dedicates four IT support resources to servicing sales and support teams before Revenera.
  • The composite reassigns 75% of these IT support resources due to Revenera’s self-service capabilities.
  • The average fully burdened annual salary of an IT support resource is $54,000.
• Customer support savings:
  • The composite has a customer support team of 30 employees.
  • Before Revenera, each customer support resource spent 25 hours per quarter gathering customer data around entitlement and licensing.
  • With Revenera, the composite experiences a 95% reduction in time spent gathering customer data around entitlement and licensing.
  • The average fully burdened hourly rate of a customer support resource is $30.
  • For this benefit, the composite has a productivity recapture rate of 50%. Customer support resources spend half of the time they save on activities that generate business value, but not all reclaimed time is dedicated to value-added work.
• Developer savings:
  • The composite dedicated six developers to custom development for entitlement management before Revenera.
  • With Revenera, the composite reassigns 90% of these developer resources.
  • The average fully burdened annual salary of a developer is $182,500.

Risks. This benefit will vary among organizations based on:

• IT support savings:
  • IT support resources dedicated to servicing sales/support teams before Revenera.
  • Average fully burdened annual salary of an IT support resource.
• Customer support savings:
  • Customer support team size.
  • Time spent gathering customer data around entitlement and licensing before Revenera.
  • Average fully burdened hourly rate of a customer support resource.
• Developer savings:
  • Developer team size working on internal software development before Revenera.
  • Average fully burdened annual salary of a developer.

Results. To account for these risks, Forrester adjusted this benefit downward by 10%, yielding a three-year, risk-adjusted total PV (discounted at 10%) of $2.5 million.

Unquantified Benefits

Interviewees mentioned the following additional benefits that their organizations experienced but were not able to quantify:

• Enhanced global compliance. Interviewees reported that using Revenera helped their organizations to more effectively navigate regional compliance requirements. By providing flexible software distribution options and a centralized system for tracking deployments, organizations could ensure that they met specific regulatory needs without disrupting operations.
   
  • The director of digital operations in energy said: “Sometimes, there are certain regions that don’t want their software deployed from the cloud and instead ask us to send it by DVD. To accommodate this, we make the software available in Revenera so we can track it, but we also send the DVD. Other than that, most people just receive their software electronically through Revenera based on what they are entitled to use, and compliance issues rarely come up.”
     
• Improved customer experience. Interviewees noted that Revenera’s centralized platform improved customer interactions by providing better visibility into entitlements and support needs. Previously, organizations faced challenges in tracking customer licensing and service agreements, which often led to inconsistent support. With Revenera, customer support teams can easily access comprehensive reports on each customer’s entitlements to ensure that inquiries are adequately addressed, which ultimately strengthened customer relationships.
   
  • The product manager in manufacturing said: “Before Revenera, there was no easy way to differentiate between customers on maintenance or subscription and those who weren’t. We ended up providing support to everyone, which was costly. Now, with Revenera, we can quickly identify who is paying for maintenance or subscriptions, which allows us to manage support resources more effectively and set clear expectations with customers.”
    
    The product manager continued: “Revenera gives us the ability to segment customers by their support status so that we can provide tiered support and offer premium services to those who are paying for ongoing maintenance or subscription. We wouldn’t have been able to do any of this without centralized tooling.”
     
• Increased sales opportunities due to improved visibility. Interviewees reported that Revenera transformed the way account managers engage with customers and identify upsell opportunities. Before investing in the platform, organizations had limited visibility into utilization data, such as fulfilment rates, feature usage, and service denials, which made it difficult for account managers to anticipate needs or initiate meaningful conversations around potential expansions. With Revenera, organizations had access to accurate, real-time software usage data and customizable notifications to better manage pipelines and engage customers at the right time — helping to increase the likelihood of securing new sales opportunities.
   
  • The director of R&D in engineering technology said: “One of the biggest challenges in our industry is that account managers often reengage customers a year later with little more than anecdotal feedback from conversations. There’s no clear view into actual usage, which makes it hard to steer sales conversations and identify the best next steps with customers. Revenera gives us analytics around what customers are using, and that insight changes everything.”
    
    The director of R&D continued: “We’re now having more frequent conversations with customers when they are nearing the end of their credits or have already used them up. We’re able to initiate discussions about purchasing more often.”
    
     
• Provided Revenera support. Interviewees shared that Revenera’s customer support played a key role in helping their teams navigate licensing and entitlement management with confidence. With direct access to engineers who provide guidance and technical expertise around deployment, troubleshooting, and ongoing system optimization, interviewees described Revenera’s support approach as responsive and collaborative. Revenera continues to work closely with the interviewees’ organizations to ensure their licensing solutions remain aligned with evolving business needs.
   
  • The VP of product in cybersecurity said: “Revenera’s support team has been very collaborative throughout this process. They weren’t just collaborative in the usual sales-process sense — they took a customer-centric approach that addressed our technical needs. Whenever we have an issue, we can get on the phone with their engineers to help resolve it. It’s not just about Revenera’s features and functionality — we also chose them because they showed that they care about our success.”
     

Flexibility

The value of flexibility is unique to each customer. There are multiple scenarios in which a customer might implement Revenera and later realize additional uses and business opportunities, including:
 

• Business agility. Interviewees shared how Revenera has helped their organizations quickly adjust to changing market demands and take advantage of new opportunities. The platform’s analytics provided insights into trends that helped them proactively identify shifts in customer needs and emerging market opportunities. With these insights, organizations were able to make more informed decisions about pricing, product offerings, and go-to-market strategies to remain competitive in a rapidly evolving landscape.
   
  • The product manager in manufacturing explained: “Revenera has allowed us to explore new business models that would have been difficult to implement in the past. We’re developing a new offering that will have variable costs tied to power usage, so we’re working to align costs with the actual value we deliver. Without Revenera, we would have defaulted to a flat subscription or perpetual pricing model, but now we can offer flexible pricing tied to measurable savings. It’s been a great enabler for us."
     
  • The VP of product in cybersecurity shared: “Revenera has laid the groundwork for us to explore ways to incorporate new features, capabilities, and functionality into our overall business operations. We’ve been using what we learned to work on product enhancements, new go-to-market approaches, and a more efficient renewal process.”
     

Flexibility would also be quantified when evaluated as part of a specific project (described in more detail in Appendix A).