① Guide · Broadcom (CA) audit response
A Broadcom (CA) audit notice is a clock starting, not a verdict arriving. What you do before the vendor sees a single line of your deployment data sets the ceiling on the finding. Here is the hour by hour playbook for the first 48 hours, from the acknowledgement to the locked scope.
48 hour mobilization Audit notice or renewal under 18 months out? We mobilize within 48 hours.
Get expert help →Broadcom (CA) mainframe pricing is capacity based, with products moving from a MIPS basis to MSU under Broadcom Mainframe Consumption Licensing. Two patterns drive most CA audit findings. The first is full capacity exposure: a product entitled to a given capacity is found running on LPARs that now carry more, and the gap is asserted at full capacity. The second is the idle family inside a bundle, where products installed years ago and never retired are counted as deployed. Neither is settled fact. Both are built from the vendor's reading of your estate, and both are reduced by evidence you control.
The reason the first 48 hours matter is simple. Everything the vendor learns early becomes the frame for the claim. An engineer who answers a casual question about which tools are installed, a capacity figure shared before it is validated, a scope accepted without reading the audit clause: each one raises the ceiling. The work of the first two days is to slow the clock, route all contact through one point, and read your own contract before the vendor reads your systems.
What to do, and when
| Window | The vendor wants | What you do |
|---|---|---|
| Hour 0 to 1 | A fast, informal confirmation of your estate | Acknowledge receipt only. Name one point of contact. Confirm nothing about products, capacity, or LPARs. |
| Hour 1 to 4 | Engineers answering tooling questions directly | Brief the technical team to route every vendor contact through the single point. No direct answers. |
| Hour 4 to 12 | To work from its own entitlement record | Pull your contracts. Read the exact audit clause: what it permits, what data, what notice, what scope. |
| Hour 12 to 24 | Unfiltered deployment and capacity data | Begin reconstructing entitlement from original CA paper and amendments. Inventory what is actually installed and used. |
| Hour 24 to 36 | A broad, undefined scope | Propose the scope in writing: named products, named systems, the data the clause requires and no more. |
| Hour 36 to 48 | To set the timetable and the framing | Lock the scope and the process in writing. Agree validated data only, against agreed scope, on your timetable. |
The non negotiables of the first two days
A controlled first 48 hours buys the thing that wins the audit: time to validate before you respond. Once the scope is locked and the data is yours, the finding becomes negotiable. Misread capacity scope, idle bundled families that should exit rather than settle, entitlements the vendor record overlooks, and sub capacity positions defended with evidence are all routine reductions. The settlement is also the moment to fix the contract that let the exposure build, with caps on capacity growth, a clean audit clause, and a defined consumption baseline written into the close. This is the discipline of our mainframe audit defense work, where the response and the renewal are run as one engagement. For the longer arc beyond the first two days, see the Broadcom audit notice response protocol.
Acknowledge receipt, name one point of contact, and say nothing about your deployment. Confirm only that you have the notice and will respond through one channel. Slow the clock and read your audit clause.
Full capacity exposure where products run on more capacity than entitled, and idle bundled families counted as deployed. Sub capacity gaps are a frequent trigger. See defending your sub capacity position.
No. Agree scope in writing first and share only what the audit clause requires. Raw early data lets the vendor build the largest possible claim and define the scope for you.
Commonly, yes. Findings are opening positions. Misread capacity, idle bundles, overlooked entitlements, and defended sub capacity positions are routine reductions, and the close is a chance to write in caps.
The portfolio, the consumption model, and the renewal behavior in one place.
When the audit and the renewal arrive together, as they often do.