Azure Partner Community: Are you utilizing all of your Azure benefits? Part 2

Read part 1 of this three-part series.

Understanding your benefit allocations as a Silver or Gold competency partner

In part 1 of this series, I explained four options for how Microsoft partners can get access to Microsoft Azure to gain hands-on experience. In this post, we’ll take a look at the Azure benefits for companies that have achieved one or more MPN competencies.

Core benefits for partners with a competency

If you are a partner that has achieved a silver or gold competency, you are eligible for these Azure benefits:

Additional benefits by competency

There are also three competencies that include incremental Azure benefits on top of the core benefits noted above.

Competency benefit examples: Single location

Let’s walk through a few examples of how your Microsoft Azure benefits work if you are a partner that has earned your competencies at one location (e.g., headquarters). This will help you better understand the basic rules about how Azure benefits are allocated by competency. Then, we’ll go into more details for a partner that has competencies associated across multiple locations.

Scenario #1: Partner with one competency

In this scenario, an MPN member organization with a single location has achieved a Gold competency that is not the Application Development competency, Application Lifecycle Management competency, or Cloud Platform competency. I’ll cover those three competencies below, because they have additional Azure benefits associated with them.

Based on the benefit allocation rules explained earlier in this post, this partner is eligible to receive up to $1,100/month of Azure benefits across 11 Azure subscriptions:

• $100/month comes from the core Internal Use Rights for earning a competency
• $1,000/month comes from the core benefits of earning a Gold competency

Earning one Silver competency is similar to the above example, but instead of getting 10 Azure subscriptions through MSDN Visual Studio Premium grants, the partner would receive 5 Azure subscriptions and be eligible for up to $600/month of Azure benefits across 6 subscriptions.

Scenario #2: Partner with one “specialized” competency

There are two MPN competencies that come with additional MSDN benefits: Application Development and Application Lifecycle Management. This scenario applies to both of these competencies.

In this scenario, an MPN member organization has achieved the Gold Application Development competency, and has a single MPN location.

Based on the benefit allocation rules explained earlier in the post, this partner is eligible to receive up to $3,600/month of Azure benefits across 36 Azure subscriptions:

• $100/month comes from the core Internal Use Rights for earning a competency
• $1,000/month comes from the core benefits of earning a Gold competency
• An additional Azure benefit of $2,500/month is associated with earning the Gold Application Development Competency

There are three other one-off scenarios that follow the same pattern:

Silver Application Development Competency – up  to $1,100/month of Azure benefits across 11 subscriptions

• Internal Use Rights: 1 Azure subscription @ $100/month
• Silver competency MSDN core benefit: 5 Azure subscriptions @ $100/month
• Silver Application Development Competency MSDN benefit: 5 Azure subscriptions @$100/month

Silver Application Lifecycle Management Competency – up to $750/month of Azure benefits across 7 subscriptions

• Internal Use Rights: 1 Azure subscription @ $100/month
• Silver competency MSDN core benefit: 5 Azure subscriptions @ $100/month
• Silver Application Lifecycle Management Competency MSDN benefit: 1 Azure subscription @$150/month

Gold Application Lifecycle Management Competency – up to $1,850/month of Azure benefits across 16 subscriptions

• Internal Use Rights: 1 Azure subscription @ $100/month
• Gold competency MSDN core benefit: 10 Azure subscriptions @ $100/month
• Gold Application Lifecycle Management Competency MSDN benefit: 5 Azure subscriptions @$150/month

Scenario #3: Partner with a Cloud Platform competency

The Cloud Platform competency is the third competency that includes additional Internal Use Rights benefits.

In this scenario, an MPN member organization has achieved the Gold Cloud Platform Competency and has a single MPN location.

Based on the benefit allocation rules explained earlier in this post, this partner is eligible to receive up to $1,600/month of Azure benefits across 12 Azure subscriptions, plus as an additional $5,000 Azure credit:

• $100/month comes from the core Internal Use Rights for earning a competency
• $500/month + $5,000 Azure credit comes from the Gold Cloud Platform Competency internal use rights benefit
• $1,000/month comes from the core benefits of earning a Gold competency

Earning the Silver Cloud Platform Competency is similar to the above. The partner is eligible for up to $850/month of Azure benefits across 7 subscriptions plus a $3,000 Azure credit.

Scenario #4: Partner with a mix of gold and silver competencies

This scenario helps illustrate some of the limits associated with the competency-related Azure benefits.

In this scenario, an MPN member organization has achieved multiple competencies:

• Three gold competencies: Gold Cloud Platform Competency, Gold Application Development Competency, Gold Application Lifecycle Management Competency,
• Three silver competencies: Silver Datacenter Competency, Silver Data Platform Competency, and a Silver Messaging Competency.

Based on the benefit allocation rules explained earlier in this post, this partner is eligible to receive up to $4,850/month of Azure benefits across 42 Azure subscriptions, plus an additional $5,000 Azure credit.

Notes about this scenario:

• You get only one core IUR benefit per location for the first Gold or Silver competency earned at that location
• You get only one core MSDN benefit per location based on the highest level competency earned at that location. The core benefit is a Gold benefit in the example above because this partner has earned at least one Gold competency.
• All three of the “specialized” competencies—Application Development, Application Lifecycle Management and Cloud Platform—are additive to the base benefits, regardless of whether or not they are Silver or Gold. In this example all three were Gold, but any one or all of them could have been Silver. The benefits would still be added, with the only difference being the allocation amounts.
• The three silver competencies had no additional impact on the Azure benefits at this location because a Gold competency was already achieved. Likewise, any additional Gold competencies at this location would not impact overall Azure benefits as this partner has maximized the Azure benefits a partner can achieve at one location.

Competency benefit examples: Multiple locations

For the majority of Microsoft partners that have multiple locations in their Microsoft Partner Network membership, Azure benefits are the same as for a single location, with these exceptions:

• If the partner has multiple locations within one country they may qualify to purchase additional Benefit Toolkits, which increase the Azure benefits available
• If the partner has locations that span countries, there are additional Azure benefits that would be available to this partner

If you are a partner with multiple locations, contact MPN support to find out if you are eligible for additional Azure benefits.

Resources

I hope you now have a better understanding of the Azure benefits that are available to you as a competency partner, and that you’ll take full advantage of those benefits to get your team up to speed. Here are the resources I used to compile the information above. Please remember that benefit eligibility and access are subject to the rules, policies, and limits set by the Microsoft Partner Network.

Activating your Azure Benefits

• Activating Microsoft Azure internal-use rights licenses
• Assign MSDN subscription access and privileges
• Activate an MSDN subscription

Understanding IUR vs. MSDN licenses – Product Usage Guide

Microsoft Partner Network membership

• Microsoft competencies
• Core benefits
• MSDN subscriptions for MPN members and MSDN subscription Azure Credit amounts