TIBCO’s integration and messaging products are the core of its on-premises installed base. They are licensed in three overlapping ways: the TIBCO Platform subscription with component-level usage metrics, older Pack-based bundles such as TIBCO Integration and Messaging - Enterprise Edition, and legacy per-product or per-Processor orders. This article describes each and the runtime activation that enforces them.
TIBCO Platform
The TIBCO License Information page, headed “Effective July 11, 2025”, supplements the Cloud Software Group terms for TIBCO Platform, two Platform Add-ons (Business Process Management and Event Processing), Enterprise Foresight and its Healthcare Add-on, the Enterprise Fulfillment Orchestration Suite, Enterprise MDM, Enterprise Streaming and the iProcess Suite.[1]
What the subscription includes
TIBCO Platform comprises software accessible through the TIBCO Control Plane and software obtained from the TIBCO Downloads Site. A licensed customer can deploy any component of the product through the Control Plane, with two exceptions. First, a licensed customer can run one TIBCO Platform Organization on the TIBCO Operated Control Plane (a limit that does not apply to a customer-run Control Plane). Second, if an Add-On product can be deployed through the Control Plane, doing so requires an active entitlement to that Add-On, licensed separately from TIBCO Platform, and the customer is responsible for validating its entitlement before deployment.[1] Software from the Downloads Site can also be deployed in the customer environment, and the page lists a bill of materials under each product name.[1]
The Platform bill of materials groups components as Integration (ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks SmartMapper Enterprise Server, adapters, TIBCO Integration for Platform), Messaging (EMS clients, Messaging - Enterprise Edition, Rendezvous daemons and network service), Data Grid, Integration - B2B (BusinessConnect, Managed File Transfer) and Integration - Mainframe (Substation ES, Mainframe RED, Transaction Interface for CICS and IMS), plus Hawk SNMP Adapter and RedTail. The BPM Add-on covers TIBCO BPM Enterprise, which also includes ActiveMatrix Service Grid, and the Event Processing Add-on covers BusinessEvents Enterprise Edition.[1]
Versions
While the customer holds an active entitlement, the licence covers any supported version of the listed components, with a table of component version exceptions. At the time of retrieval the table contained one entry, ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks SmartMapper Enterprise Server 6.0.0, with a reference to a support article.[1] A customer should check the End of Support information for the status of versions of the products and their components.[1]
Usage metrics and the annual report
The customer must provide a written notice certifying the quantities deployed at the end of each annual Reporting Period for each component, with the environment type (Development, Test or Production). Each report is due 60 days after the period, and the final report is due 90 days before the end of the final period and covers only its first 8 months.[1] The metrics are as follows.[1]
| Component group | Components | Metric reported |
|---|---|---|
| Integration | ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks, Flogo Enterprise, BusinessWorks Container Edition | Application Instance |
| Integration | Integration - Connectivity for TIBCO Platform | List of which connectors are used |
| Messaging | Enterprise Message Service, FTL, eFTL, Rendezvous, Apache Kafka, Apache Pulsar | Connection |
| Messaging | Rendezvous Network Service | Network Service Instance |
| Data Grid | ActiveSpaces, Apache Cassandra | Node |
| Integration - B2B | Managed File Transfer products | Files transferred and gigabytes transferred in the period |
| Integration - B2B | BusinessConnect and protocols | Transactions in the period |
| Integration - Mainframe | Substation ES, Mainframe RED | MSU |
| Event Processing Add-on | BusinessEvents Enterprise Edition | Application Instance |
| BPM Add-on | BPM Enterprise | Named User and Process Instance |
The page notes that these metrics can change with six months notice.[1] It also contains the other Cloud Software Group products listed above, with metrics such as Core/vCPU for Enterprise Streaming, MDM Patterns and the iProcess Engine, Named User for iProcess Workspace and Developer, Trading Partner for Fulfillment Provisioning, and Transactions for Foresight Instream.[1]
Definitions on the page
An Application Instance is a single instance of an application for each component in the metrics table. For container platforms such as Cloud Foundry, Kubernetes and OpenShift, it is a single instance of an application running inside a container.[1] For Enterprise Message Service a Connection is the connection established between an application built with the EMS client libraries and an instance of the EMS server. For the other messaging components it is a network link established by an application built with the FTL, eFTL, Apache Pulsar, Apache Kafka or MQTT client libraries to the corresponding server or broker. TIBCO Hawk and TIBCO Messaging Monitor are exempt from the Rendezvous connection count.[1] A Node is an ActiveSpaces copyset node or proxy, each an operating system process with a unique process id, or a node of TIBCO Gemini powered by Apache Cassandra.[1] MSU is Millions of Service Units, based on the then-current IBM rating for IBM Z compatible hardware.[1]
Pack-based products
TIBCO Integration and BusinessWorks Enterprise
The licence information for TIBCO Integration 2.6.0 (release date May 2021) says customers may use the product components within the number of Packs licensed. One Pack is 1 Processor with ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks, or 1 Processor or 25 Application Instances with BusinessWorks Container Edition, or 100 Flogo Application Instances with Flogo Enterprise, or 4,000 concurrent Flogo application instances when used with AWS Lambda or on IoT devices.[2] When deploying on premise, the choice between Processors and Application Instances for BusinessWorks applies to all on-premise Packs. Each Pack also allows equivalent capacity of one or more connectors listed in a rights-to-use file.[2] The release also notes that the Pack definition changed from release 2.2.0, so earlier releases use a different definition.[2]
BusinessWorks Enterprise 1.9.0 (release date May 2020) defines a Pack as 1 Processor with ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks, or 1 Processor or 15 Application Instances with BusinessWorks Container Edition.[3] The ratio of Application Instances per Pack is therefore 15 in this release and 25 in TIBCO Integration 2.6.0. The ratio is a release-level attribute and cannot be assumed from one product to another.
The Business Unit Terms define related bundles: for the ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks Plug-ins a Pack is either 1 Processor (with ActiveMatrix BusinessWorks) or 6 Containers (with BusinessWorks Container Edition), and for TIBCO Hybrid Integration Suite a Pack is 1 Suite Processor or 6 Containers.[7] A “Container” is an isolated operating system environment on which the Software is licensed to run, which can be limited in CPU, memory and disk usage as well as network access.[7]
Messaging - Enterprise Edition
Messaging - Enterprise Edition 3.1.0 (release date November 2020) defines one Pack as 1 Instance of TIBCO FTL, eFTL, Enterprise Message Service, Apache Kafka or Apache Pulsar, or 100 Mobile Instances of eFTL or of the TIBCO Messaging Eclipse Mosquitto Distribution. For counting, an Instance or Container Instance is an operating system process using the EMS, FTL, Kafka, Pulsar or non-mobile eFTL APIs, and a Mobile Instance is a browser or mobile client using the eFTL JavaScript, Node.js, GoLang, Python or REST APIs, or MQTT APIs. The text states a Pack is either one Instance, 5 Container (such as Docker) Instances or 100 Mobile Instances.[4] The Business Unit Terms give a different default for TIBCO Messaging in general: four stand-alone Instances, four Connected Processors or Virtual CPUs, or 1,000 web or mobile Instances, “unless otherwise stated in the Documentation”.[7] The product documentation therefore controls.
For Enterprise Message Service itself, the Business Unit Terms define an Instance as an EMS server or client, each an operating system process with a unique process id, where a client is a process linking the EMS client libraries.[7] The same definition counts every client process, not only brokers, which is why large messaging estates are counted by connections or client processes rather than servers.
ProdPlus and non-production
For Messaging - Enterprise Edition, ProdPlus is a licence type that includes 1 Unit of Production and unlimited units of Non-Production.[4] The generic definition in the Business Unit Terms is 1 Unit of Production or Hot Standby, 4 Units of Test, 5 Developers and unlimited Warm or Cold Standby.[7] Non-Production means a non-operational environment that is not processing live data and is not running any operations of the customer, and it is defined to include development, hot standby, high-availability and test environments.[7]
Runtime activation
TIBCO products with current entitlements require a licence file or an activation service. BusinessWorks Container Edition 6.12.0 requires activation by a licence to start. Licences are generated on the TIBCO Software Downloads site, and the applications shut down at the end date of the entitlement and do not restart until the licence file is replaced with one containing a new end date.[5] The two activation options are in-product activation (a licence file mounted into the container or embedded in the image) and the TIBCO Activation Service.[5] Enterprise Message Service 10.5.0 takes a licence parameter containing a file path or the URL of the TIBCO Activation Service, optionally with a fingerprint; if none is provided the server looks for a file named tibemslic.bin on its path and then tries a licence server at a default URL.[6]
For asset management this has two consequences. Entitlement end dates are enforced by the software, so a renewal that is late can stop container applications, and the licence files themselves are an inventory source for entitlement dates.
Restricted-licence and third-party notes
The additional product-specific terms state that BusinessEvents, Collaborative Information Manager, ActiveMatrix Service Performance Manager and ActiveFulfillment (including when bundled) are subject to a restricted licence and contain third-party proprietary code usable only in conjunction with the Software.[9] Products containing dental or medical code sets (CDT, CPT) carry the code owners’ terms, including territory limits.[9]
Audit and reports for integration estates
The EUA audit clause applies to these products like any other, and the version in a product package matters: the 2.0 text shipped with EMS 10.4.0 shifts audit costs when noncompliance exceeds 5 percent of entitlement, whereas version 2.5 uses material noncompliance.[10] See TIBCO End User Agreement, audit and maintenance.
Counting checklist
- For each component, identify the metric in the current licence-information page, and compare it with the metric in the Order.
- For BusinessWorks, establish whether the estate is on Processors or Application Instances and which release’s Pack ratio applies.
- For messaging, count client connections or client processes as the product page defines them, and exclude Hawk and Messaging Monitor from Rendezvous counts as the page provides.
- Record the environment type for each deployment so the annual report can split Development, Test and Production.
- Keep the licence files and activation service records with end dates.