When three security tools came up for renewal, we sat down with the people who used them. We wanted to know which features they still needed and which of those features the client already owned.
Three renewals, two overlaps
A renewal quote tells you what it will cost to keep a product for another year. It rarely tells you whether something else you pay for can do the same job. For that, you need two people in the conversation. One knows the licenses. The other knows what would break on Monday morning if the tool disappeared.
We worked through the three security tools with the client’s technical team. The features they used in two of those tools were already included in their Microsoft licenses. Once we understood the overlap, we consolidated their tools and moved the relevant security work to Microsoft Defender.
The client’s existing ModernOps retainer covered the migration. The roughly $85,000 they saved each year came from lower software licensing costs. That figure excludes service fees.
If you’re reviewing a renewal of your own, ask the person who uses the tool to show you one real example. Which alert did they act on last week? Where did it go? Does another team rely on the report it produces? Those details tell you what an alternative has to do. Even when you own the right feature, someone has to configure it, test it and take responsibility for running it. That work belongs in the renewal decision.
Where the team found 39 hours a month
The same client had another cost that never appeared on a renewal quote. Engineers spent part of every month patching applications, setting up new hires, cleaning up access and running upgrades. Those jobs kept coming back regardless of what else was on the calendar.
We helped the team automate the recurring steps. Across four jobs, that freed an estimated 39 staff hours each month.
| Recurring work | Estimated hours freed per month |
|---|---|
| Application and runtime patching | 16 |
| New-hire setup | 12 |
| Group and guest account cleanup | 6 |
| VMware Tools upgrades | 5 |
| Total | 39 |
That’s nearly a full workweek each month that the team could put toward its backlog. The licensing savings showed up on the bill. The automation gave engineers time to spend elsewhere.
The team also had a way to check how well the patching work was getting done. In December 2025, it estimated that about 60% of devices met its patch policy. By September 2026, that figure was about 95%. If you’re considering patch automation, both measures are worth tracking. How much hands-on time does each cycle take, and how many devices meet policy when it’s finished?
All of that is what this client got back for the time its team spent with ours.
What to bring to a two-hour working session
If a renewal is coming up, bring the quote, the renewal date and the person who depends on the tool. A list of the platforms you already license helps, too. Together, our technical teams can compare what you use with what you own and identify anything that needs a hands-on test. Once you know what switching would involve, you can weigh that work against another year of renewal fees.
If a recurring task is eating up time, bring the person who did it last. Have them walk us through one example. An invoice approval that keeps getting stuck between finance and operations is as good a starting point as a new-hire setup ticket. Which steps repeat every time? Which exceptions need someone’s judgment? Multiply the hands-on minutes you could remove by the number of times the job runs each month, and you have a first estimate of the time you could give back.