General questions
Information about the Cisco Enterprise Agreement 3.0 buying program
Q. What is the Cisco
® Enterprise Agreement 3.0 (Cisco EA), and what are the benefits?
A. The Cisco Enterprise Agreement is a single 3- or 5-year agreement that brings the power of our entire portfolio under a single agreement that can scale rapidly, so you can accelerate at the speed of business. It delivers:
● Business agility: Accelerate business transformation with easier access to technology
● Premium experience: Have full visibility into your entitlements
● Unmatched value: Maximize your investment with access to exclusive offers
Q. What can customers purchase under a Cisco EA?
A. The Cisco Enterprise Agreement 3.0 includes five portfolios: Networking Infrastructure, Applications Infrastructure, Collaboration, Security, and Services.
Q. What is a portfolio?
A. Portfolios are collections of technology and services suites specifically designed to address customer needs. Customers can start with one portfolio and expand to include other portfolios as necessary to support their business needs.
Q. Do all portfolios have to have the same term?
A. The initial order establishes the term for all suites in the agreement and the coordinated schedule for all True Forward events. By default, subsequent orders are co-termed to the initial order.
Q. What is the geographic availability for the Cisco EA?
A. The Cisco EA is available globally. Contact your Cisco account team for more information.
Q. Can the Cisco EA cover just a portion of a customer’s network?
A. We cannot split an EA by divisions, only by legal entities. Cisco EAs require a 100% commitment from the legal entities selected in the scope of participating affiliates. If employees and/or devices reside in a separate legal entity, we can exclude that entity from the participating affiliate list, and this entity would not count toward the Enterprise Agreement.
Q. How is Cisco EA different from offerings by competitive vendors?
A. Unique features of Cisco EA are its 15% user-based growth allowance (applicable for the Collaboration and Security portfolios), True Forward, and cross-architecture coverage with the ability to add security and services with the purchase of the Networking Infrastructure, Applications Infrastructure, or Collaboration portfolios.
The Cisco EA 3.0 includes both Full Commit Suites, which typically require a minimum commitment and enterprise-wide coverage where applicable, and Partial Commit Suites, which have no minimum (with some exceptions for the Security portfolio) or enterprise-wide coverage requirement.
Q. What is True Forward?
A. True Forward is an adjustment process to account for growth in Cisco EA 3.0 and includes payment for that growth. If a customer overconsumes, True Forward will take effect on the next scheduled True Forward event, depending on the full or partial commit status of the suite, and will continue until the end of the Cisco EA term.
Q. Is the value of my purchase transferable?
A. Yes, you can shift the remaining value of one license to another within a suite if the suite is eligible for a value shift.
Q. What happens if there is a True Forward event in the final year of a Cisco EA term?
A. Any additional licenses added to Full Commit Suites during the final 12 months of the contract will be captured during the next Cisco EA contract. Any licenses added to Partial Commit suites in the final year will be captured in the next quarterly True Forward event, except for the final quarter. Licenses added in the final quarter will be captured during the next Cisco EA contract. Should the contract not be renewed, the customer would be required to purchase the minimum a la carte term allowed for licenses added after their last True Forward.
Q. How does cross-architecture coverage work?
A. When a customer has at least one Full Commit suite in the Networking Infrastructure, Applications Infrastructure, or Collaboration portfolios and has at least $100,000 in fully committed Total Contract Value (TCV) in the EA, they unlock access to the Security and Services portfolios without having to make an enterprise-wide commitment to the additional suites. Also, during the term of the EA, the customer can easily add other portfolios to their agreement.
Q. Can the customer scale down the quantity of products and services after entering the Cisco EA 3.0?
A. No, a customer cannot scale down the quantity of products and services after entering the Cisco EA 3.0.
Q. Is a customer required to purchase all portfolios from the same partner?
A. No, the Cisco EA 3.0 allows for each portfolio to be purchased through a different partner. However, the Services portfolio must be purchased by the same partner through which the product portfolio was purchased.
Q. What is the EA Workspace?
A. The EA Workspace is a simple, enterprise-wide license management and provisioning tool. It serves as a common platform for the Cisco EA 3.0. The EA Workspace enables customers to:
● Manage and provision licenses
● Generate software licenses without using Product Authorization Keys (PAKs)
● Use their Smart Account to manage user access to EA licenses
Q. How do customers get access to the EA Workspace?
A. The customer must first create a Smart Account. The Smart Account is a customer- or partner-managed centralized account that provides full visibility into and access control of Cisco smart software licenses. After the Smart Account is created, go to the “License” quadrant on software.cisco.com and select Enterprise Agreements. Log in using your Cisco credentials and select the Smart Account associated with your Enterprise Agreement. You will then have access to view and manage your EA portfolios.
Q. Where can I find more Cisco EA 3.0 content?
Q. What is the minimum purchase requirement for the Cisco EA 3.0?
A. The minimum purchase requirement is $100,000 in TCV. This can be met by the purchase of one or more Full Commit Suites. Most suites require enterprise-wide commitment and a minimum TCV spend to qualify as Full Commit Suites.
Q. How does the customer order hardware during the Cisco EA term? Won’t they be charged again for the Cisco software?
A. For hardware that has mandatory software attach, associating a customer’s Smart Account with the order in Cisco Commerce Workspace (CCW) will cause it to recognize that the hardware order is covered by an EA and will automatically discount the software cost by 100%. The software is built to order and will be preinstalled on the hardware before shipment.
Q. How does a customer get support for non-hardware-related failures?
A. They should call Customer Interaction Network (CIN) and get access via their master contract number, which will list all products from Cisco product families covered under their Cisco EA contract. Although Software Support Service and software in general are not serialized, as long as the product family is listed on their master contract, the customer will be entitled. When a customer buys Cisco EA, we entitle all product families in the portfolio that the customer purchases.
For more information on the portfolios, please visit the Portfolio Guides:
● Networking
● Applications
● Security
● Collaboration
● Services
Partner-related Cisco EA questions
General information
Q. Can you have different partners per portfolio?
A. Yes, EA 3.0 allows for a single partner for each portfolio, except for the Services portfolio, which allows for a different partner for each Services suite corresponding to a primary portfolio.
Q. How do I know if my partner is eligible to sell the Cisco EA?
A. You can find eligible Cisco EA partners with the
Partner Locator tool. Click Advanced Search Criteria > Authorizations. Check the boxes for the EA enrollments you require.
Q. What certifications are required for partners to single-enroll across architectures?
A. Advanced Architecture Specializations and Buying Model Commerce certifications.
Q. Can a third-party importer be used in the Cisco EA deals?
A. Yes, but the third-party importer must have the buying model’s commerce certification.
Q. Do partners have access to the Cisco EA Workspace?
A. If a customer grants the partner access to their Smart Account, then yes, the partner will have visibility into their customer’s entitlement and consumption in the EA Workspace.