The license server is timing out.
Add a system variable called FLEXLM_TIMEOUT with a value of 1000000000.
99% of the time this will solve your problem.
Rusty
Hi nrekowski,
You might have more luck searching and posting this on the Installation & Licensing forum:
http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Installation-Licensing/bd-p/24
I did a quick search and found these:
http://forums.autodesk.com/t5/Installation-Licensing/Flexnet-License-error-97-121/m-p/3576732#M48307
I hope this helps.
Best of luck to you in all of your Inventor pursuits,
Curtis
http://inventortrenches.blogspot.com
Nrekowski,
The -97 usually indicates that it did not recognize the vendor deamon on the license server.
I will contact you off line and have you send me the log file off of your license server.
Bob Holland
Autodesk Product Support