The MIPS capacity squeeze is real. The contract usually predates it.

Mainframe contracts are the largest single line items most enterprises carry on their software estate, and the contracts predate the current capacity dynamics by years. MIPS based pricing was built into the original paper at a time when capacity was provisioned in chunks that no longer match how modern z systems run. The renewal cycle arrives with the seller's quote priced against the chunk model and the buyer's deployment running on a different one.

The desk works two mainframe contract families. MIPS capacity, where the capacity definition, sub capacity reporting and growth allowance clauses decide most of the renewal envelope. And IPLA, MSU and ESP mainframe, where the individual product licensing agreements stack against each other and against the underlying capacity metric in ways that the unified renewal rarely models honestly.

Audit posture on mainframe runs on the slowest cycle of any product the desk handles and lands on the largest numbers. The reconciliation between sub capacity reporting and the contract definition is where most of the exposure lives. The defense begins with an independent capacity map and ends with a settlement that ideally folds into the renewal so the buyer signs once.

Each product child page below describes the contract clauses we rewrite, the typical reduction we deliver, and the case study that proves it.