Sizing guide: Cost & Billing
The cost of Cost & Billing is determined primarily by the number of calculations, finalizations, and synchronizations executed per month, all of which are charged under Automation.
Parameters
| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| Calculations per month | Cost & Billing calculations executed each month, including recalculations. |
| Synchronizations per month | Synchronizations executed each month between Cost & Billing and the third-party source. |
| Finalizations per month | Finalized calculations executed each month. |
| Financial records | Contracts, rate cards, value units, groups, items, and other configuration records. |
| Retention | How long billable events and calculation records are kept in the system (default: 12 months). |
| SaaS | Whether the solution is Skyline-hosted (DaaS). |
Note
Cost & Billing is sized on calculations rather than events, because a billable event may be recalculated multiple times during its lifecycle.
Service volumes
| Category | Service | Units / month | Calculation method |
|---|---|---|---|
| Data Plane | Unmanaged Objects | (events × retention × records per event) + financial records |
Billable events accumulate over the retention window. Configuration records are added separately. |
| Automation | Actions | calculations + finalizations + (synchronizations × 2) |
Each calculation executes the calculation scripts. When a calculation needs to be finalized, a finalization script is executed. Each synchronization executes an event synchronization script and an item & group synchronization script. |
| Storage as a Service | Information Events | calculations × 3 + finalizations × 1 + synchronizations × 4 |
Each calculation generates three information events and each finalization generates one information event. Every synchronization process generates four information events, capturing both user actions and execution results. |
| DataMiner as a Service | Hosted Managed Objects | 1,000,000 metrics (min) |
Cost & Billing has negligible device metrics. The 1M metric DaaS minimum baseline always applies for hosted deployments. |
Note
Billable events, nodes, and billable items are stored as separate DOM entities. Contracts, rate cards, value units, assignments, items, and groups are referenced and reused rather than created per event.
Configured examples
| S | M | L | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Events / month | 1,000 | 5,000 | 10,000 |
| Calculations / month | 2,000 | 10,000 | 20,000 |
| Finalizations / month | 1,000 | 5,000 | 10,000 |
| Synchronizations / month | 31 | 31 | 31 |
| Financial records (assumption) | 5,000 | 20,000 | 50,000 |
| Retention | 12 mo | 12 mo | 12 mo |
| SaaS | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Unmanaged Objects (32 × events × retention) + financial records | 389,000 | 1,940,000 | 3,890,000 |
| Actions calculations + finalizations + (synchronizations × 2) | 3,062 | 15,062 | 30,062 |
| Information Events (calculations x 3) + finalizations + (synchronizations x 4) | 7,124 | 35,124 | 70,124 |
| Hosted Managed Objects | 1,000,000 | 1,000,000 | 1,000,000 |
For sizing purposes, the following assumptions were used:
- 32 retained records per event: 1 billable event + 10 nodes + 1 group + 10 cost billable items + 10 billing billable items.
- Calculations: Two calculations per event lifecycle.
- Synchronization: Default synchronization every 24 hours (31 per month).
The values above are planning assumptions intended to represent a typical operational deployment.
Tip
Actual volumes may vary depending on event complexity, calculation frequency, and retention policy. Run your own estimate in the Admin app.
What does not affect this estimate
- Number of users: DataMiner is not seat-licensed. User count has no impact on usage or pricing.
- Calculated financial amount: The cost or billing total has no impact on platform usage.
- MediaOps jobs: If Cost & Billing is integrated with MediaOps, jobs are already accounted for in the MediaOps sizing model and are not charged again in Cost & Billing.
- Standard configuration entities: Contracts, rate cards, value units, assignments, items, and groups typically contribute only a small fraction of the overall footprint.
Important
This applies to the standard Cost & Billing Solution only, which includes synchronization, calculation, recalculation, and finalization workflows as part of normal operation. If the solution is extended with custom automation, approval workflows, ERP or accounting integrations, invoice-generation workflows, or third-party financial platforms, those Automation Actions are charged in addition to this estimate. The same applies when integrating with external financial or operational systems: receiving, creating, updating, or deleting financial records from external platforms can generate additional Automation Actions. This may also require Connector Services and additional Managed Objects. Size those separately using the Data Plane, Data Sources, and Automation sizing guides.