During the last years Microsoft Corporation implement the initiative Cloud First as part of the overall strategy.

the changes are made step by step and each change impact different area in the company for example new products like SPE E3/E5 (Secure Productive Enterprise), pricing, channels etc.

in accordance to those changes, Microsoft announce last week an important licensing change for customers purchasing through the Microsoft Products and Services Agreement (MPSA)

as a wide strategy licensing transformation , all online services subscription durations on MPSA to one year or shorter. As of April 1, 2017, the multi-year duration options for Office 365, Dynamics 365, Secure Productive Enterprise, and all other online services subscriptions will no longer be available through the MPSA. This will bring MPSA into alignment with subscription durations in the Cloud Solution Provider program (CSP) and Microsoft Online Services Program (MOSP), and make buying choices easier. Customers interested in multi-year subscription durations, as well as the benefit of price protection, should consider the Enterprise Agreement.

This change does not impact MPSA customers who purchased multi-year durations prior to April 1. Existing subscriptions remain unaltered, and users can continue to be added to those subscriptions with same service end dates.

by doing that, Microsoft keeps the Enterprise Agreement program (EA) as the only multi-year agreement available to customers who’s buying Online Services , and on second hand provide additional competitive option to “non EA” customers.

earlier this year Microsoft announced that it increase the minimum required for signing new enterprise agreement negotiation from 250 to 500. directing customers with fewer than 500 users/devices to CSP (Cloud Solution Provider)  or MPSA program.

those changes are part of the licensing transformation and future infrastructure to the customer segmentation in the cloud era.