Licensing on-premises & air-gapped software

A vendor whose product runs inside the customer’s data center — sometimes with no internet path at all — who still needs enforced seats and real usage data.

The shape: the license is a signed artifact the software verifies by itself. Connectivity determines only how the artifact travels: over the network, or on a USB stick.

How the pieces map

You need	You use
N concurrent users on the customer’s cluster	Floating seat allocation — sessions check in and out; a released seat is immediately reusable
Install with no internet access	Offline activation: request file out, signed response in
Usage data from inside their network	The closed loop: export accumulated usage as a file, ingest it in the portal, return a signed receipt that renews the lease
Contract-term enforcement	A time-restricted or subscription policy — the license stops validating when the term ends, even fully offline
Consumption billing on-prem	Monitored assets tracked locally, reconciled at each file swap

Integration sketch

1. The application embeds the .NET SDK with the Client.OfflineStore add-on and the pinned public key. Connected sites activate online; air-gapped sites use the request/response file flow.
2. Usage accumulates in the local transaction store regardless of connectivity. Air-gapped sites export a ZIP on a cadence matched to the lease window; each ingest returns a signed receipt that extends the lease and truncates the local log.
3. An empty export is a legitimate lease ping — the swap cadence, not connectivity, is what keeps the fleet licensed.
4. The enforcement artifacts can’t be forged on the customer’s machines: the license and every ingest receipt are signed with the provider’s key and verified on-device with the public key alone. The exported usage log itself is plain data — treat it as reporting input the platform reconciles on ingest, not as tamper-proof evidence on its own.

The trust model is the pitch

For procurement conversations: no inbound connection to the customer’s network, no phone-home requirement, no secret material on their machines — and the vendor still gets enforced terms and audited usage.

Start with the offline activation guide.