Patent ID: 8175978

Claim:
A printing apparatus comprising: a printing unit constructed to execute a printing process; an acquisition unit constructed to acquire, via a network, license information that gives a user authority to use a program executable on the printing apparatus and indicates an amount of allowed usage of the program, together with device identification information identifying an apparatus; a recognition unit constructed to recognize whether the acquired device identification information corresponds to device identification information of the printing apparatus; an installation unit constructed to, if the recognition unit recognizes that the acquired device identification information corresponds to the device identification information of the printing apparatus, install the acquired license information to use the program, wherein the installation unit does not install the acquired license information if the recognition unit recognizes that the acquired device identification information does not correspond to the device identification information of the printing apparatus; a control unit constructed to control usage of the program according to the installed license information by using a counter for counting a number of usages of the program; a production unit constructed to produce transfer license information for transferring the installed license information corresponding to the program to another printing apparatus; and a transmission unit constructed to transmit the transfer license information produced by production unit to the other printing apparatus via the network.