SDDC Manager fails to apply licenses due to statle AssignmentFault (Evaluation mode) License.

Products

• VMware vCenter Server
• VMware SDDC Manager

Issue/Introduction

• After deploying a new workload domain, SDDC Manager shows an alert for that domain: "License check: Product type VCENTER, for domain #######, is in Evaluation mode."
• SDDC Manager fails to apply a new license to an existing ESXi cluster.
• Error in the location /var/log/vmware/vcf/operationsmanager/operationsmanager.log

  com.vmware.vim.binding.cis.license.fault.AssignmentFault: License... cannot be assigned to asset... product family (VMware ESX Server, 8.0) and/or asset's version (8.0.3.0) did not match.

• A red banner or alert indicates the hosts are in 'Evaluation Mode' despite having valid licenses previously.

Environment

VMware SDDC Manager 5.x

Cause

Stale AssetEntity or LicenseEntity objects for expired or evaluation keys persist in the vCenter Server's VMware Directory Service (VMDIR/LDAP). These hidden records cause a version/family mismatch during the SDDC Manager's automated licensing task.

Resolution

This process involves manual modification of the vCenter directory service. Review these steps carefully before running them.

Note: Take an offline snapshot of all vCenter Servers in the SSO domain.

1. Log in to the Workload Domain vCenter.

2. Navigate to Administration > Licenses. You should see two entries for the same license key.
   
   
3. To identify the duplicate license using Jxplorer: Download Jxplorer from https://jxplorer.org/downloads/users.html. 
   
   
4. Connect to vCenter using Jxplorer. Refer to: Using JXplorer to connect to the vSphere Single Sign-on
   
   
5. Navigate to Services > License Service and examine the asset_entities and license_entities entries.
   
   
6. Locate the license marked as 'Evaluation' and delete this entry.
   
   
7. Log in to SDDC Manager, click on "update license" next to the license alert and add/apply the correct license key.