Cisco offers two Managed Services Buying Programs: MSLA and MSEA. Both offer solutions to the specific needs of Managed Services Providers (MSPs), such as predictable pricing, MSP license entitlement, and multiple architectures under one licensing agreement, but they also have some important differences.

MSLA - Managed Service License Agreement - is a consumption-based software licensing model designed to meet the specific needs of MSPs. MSLA enables MSPs to grow their business economically using a service delivery model that provides a pay-as-you-grow approach with enhanced licensing flexibility for our security, infrastructure, SD-WAN, CX, and IoT products.

With MSLA, MSPs order licensed software with no usage commitment. There are monthly payments based on consumption. One MLSA order will service multiple end customers and can scale up and down in license counts and license types. Each month the MSP will receive an invoice based on the previous month’s license usage. This can drastically reduce operational and transactional overhead for creating offers at scale. Price lock is guaranteed for three years, and licenses can be scaled as needed. Click here to know more.

The easiest way to start as Managed Services Provider. Open your subscription at zero cost and add or remove licences as needed. You’ll only pay for what you use.

MSLA buying program process is set up to support Managed Services business:

Build Managed Service Offer

Create a robust Managed Service that leverages the software licenses

Enroll in the MSLA program

Click to accept MSLA terms in the Partner Program Enrollment (PPE) tool

Place initial
$0 order

In CCW order MSLA SKY(s) at $0 cost

Usage is captured monthly

All Smart Metering-enabled MSLA products capture usage on a monthly basis

Recieve invoice monthly

Pay only for what you use in the prior month

MSEA - Managed Services Enterprise Agreement - allows an MSP to offer all of Cisco’s technology, with multisuite discounting, as a managed services offering to one named end customer. MSEA retains all the benefits of a standard Cisco EA such as True Forward, multi-year discounting, value shift, and multi-suite incentives wrapped up into a committed termed contract. For use with one end customer (either Partner entitled, or Customer entitled). This program is only offered to those partners that have achieved Gold or Premier Provider status.

How Providers benefit with MSEA

Platform for provider profitability	Strategically compete	True forward invoicing	Single platform for cross sell	Partner-Cisco aligned
Monetise managed services with license management tools	Offer multi-architecture solutions and your own unique services	Fast time to customer invoicing with no risk to deal profitability	Cross sell additional managed services to end customers	Strong alignment with Cisco sellers
Provider controls the pricing and the terms of the packaged managed service to end customers	Full architecture coverage of the Cisco portfolio	True Forward allows for expansion of licence quantities for future growth	Add additional software suites as needed	Cisco sellers can help you win!
Strategic Relationship with Customers Opens Doors to Line of Business to Accelerate Business Outcomes

With MSEA you get more benefits than you get with EA (Enterprise Agreements)
as with the Provider Program MSEA counts towards MDF funds.