Changes to Microsoft 365 and Teams licensing
Changes in Europe will take effect on October 1, 2023
Microsoft is making important changes to the licensing and availability of Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Teams in the European Economic Area (EEA) and Switzerland. Beginning October 1, 2023, all new Microsoft 365 and Office 365 customers in the EEA and Switzerland will be able to choose from new offers for that region. Existing customers in the EEA and Switzerland who wish to continue using existing suites to which they have already subscribed may do so without impact.
Microsoft is making these changes in response to feedback from the European Commission (EC). They believe that this new licensing approach takes meaningful steps to address the Commission’s feedback while limiting disruption for customers and partners.
What’s changing?
Starting on October 1, 2023, Microsoft will introduce a new lineup of commercial Microsoft 365 and Office 365 suites in the EEA and Switzerland that don’t include Teams, and a new standalone Teams offering for Enterprise customers. Existing customers in the EEA and Switzerland who wish to continue using the suites to which they have already subscribed may continue to use, renew, and add seats to their current plans as usual. This new lineup will do the following:
- Introduce new EEA-and-Switzerland-specific suites without Teams, which will be named the same as the full suites plus “EEA (no Teams).” The “EEA (no Teams)” suites will be offered at a lower price than the existing suites as follows:
– Microsoft 365 E3/E5/Business Standard/Business Premium, Office 365 E1/E3/E5: EUR2.00 less
– Microsoft 365 Business Basic: EUR1.00 less
– Microsoft 365 F1/F3, Office 365 F3: EUR0.50 less - Introduce a new EEA-specific standalone Teams SKU for Enterprise: Microsoft Teams EEA: EUR5.00.
- End the sale of net-new subscriptions to all existing Enterprise SKUs with Teams (Office 365 E1/E3/E5 and Microsoft 365 E3/E5) in the EEA and Switzerland.
- Continue to offer existing SMB and Frontline suites with Teams (Business Basic/Standard/Premium, Microsoft 365 F1, Microsoft 365 F3, Office 365 F3) alongside the new versions without Teams.
Next Steps
Familiarize yourself with the full details about what’s changing. The following resources contain valuable information for addressing customer queries:
- Consult the FAQ document and partner guidance deck on the Teams in EU partner website to learn more.
- Watch this short training video to learn how to talk about this change to customers.
- Read the full details in the licensing blog and the public announcement.
For more questions, please contact microsoft.be@tdsynnex.com.
Best regards,
The Microsoft team at TD SYNNEX
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