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legioon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Chargeback Manager & ITBM or Anything else ?

Hi all,

I have many question about Chargeback Manager and ITBM.

I am using vCloud Director in my company. I thought that i want to use Chargeback Manager for managing cost and charge. But, I have read some articles with that Chargeback manager will be end of life at next year. And VMware is redirecting you to use vRealize Business for Cloud...

Already I'm using vRealize Business on my vRA environment. First question is, is vRealize Business for Cloud alternative to Chargeback manager? Because vRealize Business dashboard and reports looks like very simple. Chargeback manager looks like very complex and sounds like you can get reports for all components usage. I need bandwidth, quota and advanced report of network components. Does vRealize Business ( standart, advanced, enterprise ) meets these reports ? Which application do you advise for my environment ?

Second question is, I know that vRealize Automation is required for integrate Realize Business. I cannot integrate vRealize Business to vCloud director directly. right ?

Thanks.

8 Replies
KenNalbone
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Apparently you and I are the only two people in the world who need an answer to this question. I have the same needs as you as far as reporting goes and installed the latest version of vRealize Business for Cloud (7.2.1) this week. I have come to the conclusion that it doesn't come close to providing the kind of details that Chargeback Manager provides.  That is unless I am missing something. I have not found a single way to report on bandwidth and network components in vRealize Business.

I have opened a support request with VMware in hopes of getting clarification on the roadmap for Chargeback Manager.

Vano3D_RUS
Contributor
Contributor

Honestly -you are not ALONE ^). Still same question. As a Service Provider - want to ask - how i can do billing. Platform: vCloud Director 8.20/8.10 + vCenter 6.02U + etc.

I have vRB+vRA - but this works only for bussines- not for SPs.

.... Start install CBUIM - Cannot find license key. ....

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KenNalbone
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

CBM license keys should be associated with your account on my.vmware.com if you are a VCAN service provider with an active contract. At least, that's where I found mine. In regards to billing functionality, CBM works fine for us...for now. We are on 2.7.2 which supports vCenter 6.0 (although we are still on 5.5), but it does not yet support vCD8.20 or NSX 6.30 so we are using vCD 8.10.1 and NSX 6.2.4 for now.

I opened a support ticket with VMware to inquire about the future of CBM and was told 2.7.3 will be coming Q2 of 2017 and will support vCD 8.20 and NSX 6.30. As far as EOL, I was told it has not publicly been announced, but CBM for SPs will be retired at the end of 2017. Supposedly a future version of vRealize Business will be able meet the chargeback needs of service providers like ourselves including the ability to report on and bill for bandwidth usage, which is currently missing from the product as far as I can tell. In the meantime we will be looking at third party products such as OnApp as well so that we can ensure that we have ability to create custom reports for billing regardless of the future of Chargeback Manager or vRealize Business.

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WinStime
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

I thought that chargeback was a discontinued product replaced by vREALIZE Business...

For question 1) vRB Standard, enterprise doesn't provide dashboard with usage of bandwitch or other network component. You can only set the cost of the Giga or 10G port.

2) vRA is not required to use vRB. In version 7.0, you can use vRB without vRA. And you can configure price/cost for different kind of endpoint, including vCloud.

Do you read this ?

VRealize Business Standard 6.0.0 Documentation Center

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KenNalbone
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

CBM for most customers is discontinued. It is still available and receiving upgrades for Service Providers however.

vRealize Business for Cloud is supposed to be the product edition used by service providers. Again, the latest version (7.2.1) does not support reporting on bandwidth usage, but I was told by VMware support that 7.3 will.

No, vRA is not required, you can use the VMware Identity Manager as an alternative. Using the built in DB for auth on the vRB appliance is possible, but not supported and supposed to used for POC only.

I found this video helpful when setting up vRB Installing vRealize Business 7.2 - YouTube

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legioon
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

Hi friends, thanks for replys, i am glad to see you. I am not alone ! I was not here for a long time.  As i see it, nobody has taken satisfiying answer Smiley HappySmiley Happy

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dashevsky
Contributor
Contributor

Hi all,

Because CBM is not compatible with vcloud director 9, i want to know does anybody have successfully experience with implement service provider billing with vRealize Business?

Any suggestions and information will be helpful.

Thanks.

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smorczak
Contributor
Contributor

Hi all,

Have you tried integrate Red Hat Cloud Forms to provide managing platform for vCenter/vCloudDirector env (plus other vendors) and chargeback to the Customers?

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