How to avoid audit risk and support IT strategy in the hybrid era

This year we commissioned research in partnership with the ITAM Forum, looking at the challenges professionals in IT asset management (ITAM) and software asset management (SAM) face when managing their Oracle Java environments. Some of the findings from our ITAM Survey & Report were shocking, including 27% who admitted they now spend more than $500,000 each year fixing software-license non-compliance.   

The consequences of complex software licences

Managing enterprise software licences has always been challenging, but now in the era of hybrid cloud architectures and an increasing inventory of applications, ITAM professionals must get to grips with multiplying terms and conditions. Added to this complexity, vendors are putting customers under more pressure with audits. In the ITAM/SAM Survey & Report, 73% said they had undergone an Oracle Java audit in the past three years. As a result, it should be no surprise that ITAM professionals have a tough challenge to maintain visibility and compliance across software and IT assets.

In our survey, ITAM respondents say they are struggling to track usage consistently, both on-premises and in the cloud, which raises the stakes for every audit. Without this information, organisations may be exposed to costly gaps in licensing commitments, which is why the report revealed a fairly constant cycle of reviews. 81% of organisations said they perform licensing audits at least twice a year; 25% even shared that they conduct audits continuously; and about a quarter report frequent financial penalties and legal actions against them. 

The role of the ITAM and SAM function is changing, as well as the tools they rely on. Today, they do far more than just track assets. They serve a business-critical discipline safeguarding budgets, mitigating audit risk and guiding strategic technology decisions. Given this role expansion, and the ever-increasing complexity of IT environments, ITAM professionals face a key question: where do they prioritise their efforts?

The challenges ITAM/SAM professionals must overcome

The global ITAM market grew from approximately $1.15 billion in 2019 to $1.49 billion in 2023, representing a 6.9% compound annual growth rate. Similarly, the SAM market is expected to grow at an even faster 16% compound annual growth rate through 2029. 

This is positive for ITAM/ SAM professionals, as it suggests sustained career opportunities for the foreseeable future. But as their responsibilities increase, ITAM/ SAM professionals must work out which challenges they need to prioritise:

• Keep it in-house or use partners - 74% reported their organisations manage license discovery and software audits primarily or entirely in-house. This self-reliant approach comes with difficulties, as respondents admit they struggle to maintain accurate software usage records, understand complex licensing terms and conditions, and provide accurate licensing compliance metrics. Given pressure on ITAM/SAM resources, there is an urgent need to evaluate when it is more effective to adopt intelligent tools and work with expert partners to meet growing demand. 
• Siloed data - Integrating asset data across cloud, on-prem, and distributed teams is complex, but without a unified picture of all the data within an organisation it is difficult to maintain an accurate picture of software usage.
• Manual processes - Repetitive tasks drain time and increase human error for key resources managing the ITAM process, as well as sapping team morale as they monitor their software assets and licensing terms. 
• Security risks - At the start of the year, our 2025 State of Java Survey & Report revealed that a third of respondents feel their teams waste more than half their time chasing false positive security alerts. The problem is particularly acute in Java environments, where 41% said they encounter critical production security issues on a weekly or daily basis. ITAM/ SAM professionals are now becoming more involved in identifying vulnerabilities – in the ITAM/SAM report, 41% of ITAM teams helped identify unsupported software, and 44% contribute to cloud security monitoring.
• Licence compliance - Mismanaged licences can lead to costly audits and penalties. According to the ITAM/SAM Survey & Report, more than a third said compliance, including the management of excessive licensing, is the top issue facing their organisation. This is in addition to the IT budget spent each year resolving these licensing issues – including audits, additional licences and penalties. 
• Unreliable usage tracking - ITAM survey participants report complex software configurations that make tracking application usage more difficult. They also say their organisations struggle to know where software is installed, what is running and where the information is managed - especially when tracking software usage across teams or between on-premises and cloud platforms.

ITAM/SAM is becoming even more of a team sport. Professionals must play a strategic role in encouraging cross-departmental collaboration and educating senior leaders on the importance of compliance with licensing requirements. Particularly, with the rise of employee-based pricing from vendors like Oracle for Java, it is crucial to secure executive support so that everyone understands this issue is critical to business performance and productivity.

Given how much of software development is being automated these days, developers using components and containers could unknowingly be changing licensing terms. ITAM/ SAM professionals must work with engineering teams to ensure they follow an agreed approach. With all the complexity of modern IT infrastructures, having the right partners will be key to reducing risk and workloads, alongside the adoption of audit playbooks and process automation.

Ultimately, if ITAM/ SAM plays a more strategic role in vendor negotiations and managing IT environments, it will not only ensure license compliance, it will help to reduce security vulnerabilities and free up engineers and developers to focus on coding that benefits their organisations. Effective ITAM/ SAM strategies will make organisations more agile and able to lean on their IT systems to respond dynamically to market opportunities. At a time when productivity is so high on every board's agenda, that can only be a good thing.