BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION Distributors react to grea
Here we look at how voice and data distributors are helping partners to take advantage of the growing cloud computing market, not just through new partnerships and the availability of solutions, but also through additional services such as sales, marketing and technical support.
B
lazing a trail towards widespread adoption of the SaaS model is David Ellis,
Director of New Technologies and Services at distributor Computerlinks. Last year Computerlinks fundamentally changed its business model to deliver services to channel partners around emerging technologies such as the cloud. Over the past two years the company has invested significantly in building a strong portfolio of cloud and managed services for the channel under the ALVEA Services brand. “We understand that resellers may not want, or be able, to invest themselves in new technology areas with no guaranteed and immediate ROI,” said Ellis. “Therefore we’ve built these services, and all the related legal documentation, sales and marketing collateral and support infrastructure, to enable partners to go to market with zero up-front investment and minimum ongoing overheads.”
As the cloud and SaaS become more prevalent, organisations first need to understand how their businesses can benefit and then have access to expert support and guidance. This is where the real opportunity lies for distributors and resellers, particularly those that can wrap value around
these propositions. Along with education and support, true value added distribution partners can provide aggregated, integrated and market-ready solutions that provide greater margin opportunities for resellers than just shipping boxes.
Infrastructure
Not only does the channel need to understand the benefits of cloud-based technology for its clients, noted Ellis, it needs the infrastructure in place to deliver and support such services to provide ongoing revenue opportunities. “Computerlinks has had a multi-lingual 24x7 global support centre in place for nearly two years that provides a Network Operations Centre and all the necessary technical and commercial training and project assistance that partners need to sell, pre-configure, implement and support cloud-based solutions under their own brand,” said Ellis. “As cloud-based computing also presents new challenges and opportunities for ongoing billing and financing, we also provide partners with flexible payment models including true pay per usage.”
A key factor that differentiates Computerlinks, claims Ellis, is that the company provides all the
viable,” he said. “The distribution business model will need to evolve, as will the reseller business model as the SaaS offerings from vendors start to mature and make inroads into the market. As always, reach into the vast SMB community will be key for the channel and existing trusted relationships could still be maximised, with resellers being paid an ongoing residual commission rather than a traditional product supply margin.”
David Ellis
This model has proved viable
infrastructure and pre and post-sales support to augment what partners are already able to offer but with zero risk to their business. “This model has proved viable for our own business and an attractive way for our ALVEA Service partners to enter the cloud and managed service market with minimum risk,” Ellis added.
“ALVEA Services allow the end user to aggregate a number of areas of their IT infrastructure and pay for the service in a far more flexible way than their traditional procurement processes. ALVEA also simplifies the provisioning, management
and support of cloud-based services through a single management portal.”
Channel impact According to Simon Welch, Product Marketing Director at Azlan UK, SaaS will inevitably have an impact on the channel as applications are increasingly being written specifically to perform to a service delivery model, and to take advantage of the rapidly evolving client offerings, such as tablets, as they become the device of choice for users. “Distributors, like vendors, are already experimenting with SaaS offerings as the natural scaled point at which this can be commercially
Other obvious opportunities for the channel are in areas such as networking. The very nature of the performance requirements for SaaS means that a fast, resilient and reliable network is a pre- requisite, as is the security of access devices, VPNs etc. However, despite much talk about a cloud-based future, the emergence of the SaaS model is unlikely to be a significant threat to the traditional distribution model, according to Mark Shane, Sales Manager at ICON. “There will be some realignment of the telecoms distributor’s customer base to focus more on the data IT reseller channel, but it will be business as usual at the distributor level,” he said. “There is more likely to be a shake up in the channel itself as traditional telecoms resellers see their market coming under attack
40 COMMS DEALER MARCH 2011
www.comms-dealer.com
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