The Microsoft 365 governance gap — in Euros
Why multinational organizations overspend on Microsoft 365 licensing, and what Portalliz does about it.
Prepared for: IT Leadership & Finance · v1.0
Four structural gaps no native Microsoft tool addresses
Multinational organizations with a single Microsoft 365 tenant and regional subsidiaries consistently overspend on licensing because of four gaps the Admin Center doesn't surface.
| Waste category | Cause | Typical impact |
|---|---|---|
| Inactive licenses | Users who left — licenses still active | ~10% of total license budget |
| Redundant SKUs | E5 assigned + Power BI Pro assigned separately (already included) | €8.80/user/month per instance |
| Out-of-band assignments | Admins assign licenses directly in Microsoft Admin Center, bypassing any internal process | Unquantified until audit |
| Wrong tier | Users with E5 who only use Outlook, Teams and Word | €15–25/user/month overspend |
Example: 1,000 users, 5 countries, avg. €22/user/month
| Waste type | Calculation | Annual cost |
|---|---|---|
| Inactive licenses | 100 users × €22 × 12 | €26,400 |
| Redundant SKUs | 150 users × €8.80 × 12 | €15,840 |
| Out-of-band drift | 50 assignments × €22 × 12 | €13,200 |
| Wrong tier | 80 users × €6 × 12 | €5,760 |
| Total annual waste | €61,200 | |
Portalliz — governance on top of your existing tenant
Portalliz is a Microsoft 365 license governance platform that installs on your own infrastructure and connects to your tenant via read-only Microsoft Graph API.
What it does
- License quotas by country — reserves licenses per subsidiary before the global pool is consumed
- Monthly reservation cycle — structured request and approval workflow replacing email and Teams threads
- Out-of-band detection — flags every license assigned outside the portal, automatically
- Inconsistency engine — detects redundant SKU combinations and calculates monthly waste per user
- Audit trail — complete record of who requested, approved, and assigned what — and when
What it does NOT do
- Does not modify your tenant without explicit approval
- Does not access email, Teams, files, or any personal data
- Does not require migration or replacement of existing systems
Portalliz costs less than the waste it eliminates in the first quarter
Pricing (annual)
| Tier | Countries | Users | Annual cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | Up to 3 | Up to 1,000 | €3,588 |
| Business | Up to 10 | Up to 5,000 | €7,188 |
| Enterprise | Unlimited | Unlimited | €14,400+ |
Early access customers: 40% permanent discount. 90-day free pilot available.
ROI at Business tier (€7,188/year)
| Scenario | Users | Est. annual waste | Portalliz cost | Net savings | Payback |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Conservative | 500 | €30,600 | €7,188 | €23,412 | 3 months |
| Mid-market | 1,000 | €61,200 | €7,188 | €54,012 | 1.5 months |
| Enterprise | 3,000 | €183,600 | €14,400 | €169,200 | < 1 month |
Why this is a low-risk decision
| Risk concern | Mitigation |
|---|---|
| Data security | Read-only Graph access. Portalliz never writes to your tenant without explicit approval. |
| Data sovereignty | Self-hosted on your own infrastructure, or EU-hosted SaaS. Your data never leaves your perimeter without your choice. |
| Vendor lock-in | SQLite database is portable. All data exportable as CSV at any time. |
| Implementation risk | 90-day free pilot before any commitment. Setup in under 15 minutes via guided wizard. |
| Compliance | GDPR and LGPD compliant by design. Data Processing Agreement available. |
| Microsoft relationship | Portalliz is a governance layer on top of Microsoft 365 — not a replacement. Compatible with all Microsoft licensing models including EA. |
Before vs. after Portalliz
Before Portalliz
- License requests arrive by email, Teams, phone
- Regional admins consume from global pool without visibility
- Monthly reconciliation done manually in spreadsheets
- Out-of-band assignments discovered during audits — often months later
- No way to know actual cost by country before the invoice arrives
After Portalliz
- Every request goes through a structured cycle with cost pre-calculated
- Each country has a protected quota — other regions cannot consume it
- Out-of-band assignments flagged within 24 hours of Graph sync
- Finance sees cost by country, by SKU, by month — in real time
- IT Directors spend hours per month on governance instead of weeks
From installation to autonomous governance in four weeks
| Week | Activity |
|---|---|
| 1 | Installation and Microsoft Graph App Registration setup (30 minutes) |
| 1 | Initial configuration: countries, quotas, SKU pricing |
| 1–2 | First Graph sync — immediate visibility of inconsistencies and out-of-band assignments |
| 2–4 | First monthly reservation cycle with your team |
| 4+ | Normal operation — governance running autonomously |
No professional services required. No Microsoft consultant needed.
Built by IT, for IT
Portalliz was built by an IT leader with decades of experience managing Microsoft 365 across multinational environments — and ran out of patience with a problem that had no solution.
The product exists because the team building it lives the problem every day. Every feature was designed to solve a specific, measurable operational gap — not to fill a roadmap.
- Deployment options
- SaaS (EU-hosted) · Self-hosted (Linux/Windows/Docker) · Desktop
- Support
- Direct access to the founding team — no ticket queues on first contact
- Pilot
- 60–90 days free, no credit card, no commitment
Request a 30-minute live demo
We connect to a demo tenant and show exactly what Portalliz would find in an environment like yours.
90-day free pilot available for qualified organizations.