In this article, we discuss the automatic license management functionality provided by the Afi SaaS Backup service.
With automatic license count adjustment enabled, Afi will increase or decrease the license count for a subscription based on the current service usage. In particular, this feature can be used together with auto-protection settings for Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 to ensure that all the new users added in your domain are automatically protected and licensed.
Afi licensing model
The required licensing count is based on the Afi licensing model and relies on two factors: the count of active users with protection enabled and the amount of storage space allocated for backups. Afi requires a license for each active user, which is protected by the service, and each license includes a certain amount of backup storage (as indicated in an Order Form) that is shared across a domain. Additional backup storage should be purchased if the total backup storage utilized within the domain exceeds the allocation granted by user licenses.
Auto-licensing rules
When the automatic license adjustment feature is turned on, Afi will automatically assign extra licenses whenever the total count of active protected users increases. Similarly, it will decrease the license count if an account administrator removes protection from users or if users become "Archived." A user is considered "Archived" if it is deleted on the Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 side, suspended, or if their Microsoft 365 license is revoked.
In cases where the overall consumption of backup storage exceeds the allocation granted by user licenses, Afi will automatically add backup storage in 100 GB increments. If the storage consumption within the domain decreases (such as through the deletion of backups or the data retention policy), Afi will automatically reduce the additional storage space accordingly.
How to enable auto-licensing
The automatic license adjustment is enabled on a per-domain basis and can be configured at the Licensing → Subscription tab. After it is enabled, the Afi service will adjust the license count for the domain once per week to reflect the current domain's service usage.
You can also set an upper threshold for the number of licenses assigned to a domain or for the amount of additional backup storage as shown on the screenshot below (click on the limit control to open the threshold editing dialogue). In this case, Afi will still adjust the license count based on the service usage but will never exceed the specified thresholds.