Legal-entities and sub-units in Microsoft Partner Center terms

Hi, I represent several partners with Microsoft, and we are fast growing. In our enterprise, we do as several others, we move around locations, merge them, and restructure to improve efficiency and quality. Recently Microsoft also notified us to update and improve several of our MPN/CSP identifiers with updated information, which resulted in this post about missing features and hidden Microsoft data not available in Partner Center.

Starting out as a partner, you add your company in Partner Center, creating your PGA and first PLA account. Your PGA now refers to your legal entity, and your PLA is now a sub-unit under your PGA. So far so good (for a CSP business, you have your PGA be the MPN id and your PLA the CSP id).

As time goes by, your business grows and you start buying other MS partner companies. In comes account merge in partner center to the rescue. This will merge your MPN (not CSP, I know, atleast not in terms of your GDAP or customer relationships, but everything else), so that all your competencies, reports and information is updated accordingly. The company you have bought and merged now still has their CSP business, but reporting under your PGA. Both their original PGA and PLA accounts are now PLA under you PGA. So far this seems to be good, but now you are missing out on some data hidden internally in Microsoft, that is nowhere to be seen, and impossible to update: this original merged PGA still refers to the original legal-entity, and the PLA is still NOT connected to your PGA, but the original PGA, which is now a PLA under your PGA. So, something like, Your PGA --> The merged PGA (which is now a PLA) --> The merged PLA. Confused yet?

Now, this merged company should at some point in time become something else, maybe a department or separate location of your company. Or maybe you even move that as a department or location below some other company you have in your enterprise portfolio. Now comes the headache of updating your CSP - PLA identifiers with correct legal information.

There is currently nowhere you can read what PLA id-s are considered as legal entities, and nowhere your PLA says which legal entity they are connected to. Even filing this with MS partner support is a no-go, this information is hidden so far behind support/MCAIPP/CSP/direct/indirect/vetting/engineering/developers and god knows what, that it is currently not possible to update any of it. Not even getting to read the structure of the identifiers is possible.

I hope Microsoft can understand this is a big compliance issue over time. How many tax forms or payout accounts do you need? How many are using the same legal info for the same tax forms? Regardless of being a direct or indirect partner, who should really receive the bill? Who ends up as the owner of the different agreements? (I know this usually works out one way or another, but how many hours could have been saved on partner support if this was not a headache?)

We need to be able to see where each identifier is connected in terms of sub-units and legal-entities.

Whether by self-service or MS partner support, we need to be able to provide updates on this structure.

We need to be able to change any PLA between being a legal entity or a sub-unit, and telling which legal-entity owns the sub-unit or parent legal-entity.

Different partners have different setups, we have an enterprise setup where one company fully owns all the others and plan to fully merge them within a single legal entity, but still owned by the enterprise. Others have separate companies working together sharing Microsoft competencies and benefits under one umbrella. Having a way to let Microsoft know about structural changes and having this information visible and correct in partner center is crucial when working as a partner over time.

Bonus tip: Most countries, even Norway has officially available records on all companies registered, on official website or by official APIs - by looking up any company registration id, you can have the 100% accurate information for all legal entities, and all sub-units, we even give you the company registration id inside partner center for your benefit.