Microsoft has announced that several of its server products will reach the end of support (EoS) phase during the course of 2024. Customers that rely on these products for their operational needs could potentially face increased risks related to security and compliance, as Microsoft will halt the provision of security patches and updates for these software products.
Key Products Reaching End of Support
Among the products slated to finish their support lifecycle, Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013 stands out, concluding its support phase on January 9, 2024. Microsoft encourages users to upgrade, at least, to Dynamics CRM 2015, guidance for which is elaborated in an official document. Microsoft Host Integration Server 2013, which enables integration of IBM-hosted data with on-premises and Azure Cloud applications, also takes its final bow on the same date. A migration tool may assist organizations in transitioning to newer iterations of this service.
Further compounding the impact is the termination of support for Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 2013 on April 9, 2024. Essential for source code management, project coordination, and collaboration, upgrading from this edition could necessitate secondary updates for associated services like SharePoint and SQL Server. SQL Server 2014 will see its EoS come into effect on July 9, 2024, but Microsoft has provided pathways for users to smoothly transition to SQL Server 2022. Brighter news arrives for users of Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Parallel Data Warehouse (Analytics Platform System) as its EoS date has been extended to March 31, 2026.
Extended Security Update Program Closure
Organizations have previously been able to take advantage of Microsoft's Extended Security Update (ESU) program allowing them to receive critical security updates beyond the end of traditional product support. In 2024, some products under this program will no longer have this safety net.
The Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2 versions will conclude their ESU Year 4 support, exclusively for Azure, on January 9, 2024. Microsoft SQL Server 2012 will reach the end of its ESU Year 2 on July 9, 2024. Concluding the year, Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2 will both reach the end of ESU Year 1 on October 8, 2024. Notably, the ESU program occasionally extends a fourth year of support for workloads hosted on Azure virtual machines. Users leveraging Azure Arc along with virtual machines on Azure are only responsible for Azure's operational costs in these scenarios.
The completeness of Microsoft's plans and the detailed timelines for these conclusions reinforce the urgency with which organizations must evaluate and plan their software infrastructure for the upcoming changes.
