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07 Nov 2008
HP partners have expressed concerns that the vendor’s new Gold tier, which went live at the beginning of this month, is overpopulated.
HP has revealed that 151 of its UK Preferred partners have secured the top-level badge after meeting the $1.9m (£1.1m) revenue threshold.
Andrew Wright, sales director at HP Gold partner 2e2, said he was pleased to be part of the programme.
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But he added: “Our aspiration, and I believe HP UK’s aspiration, was for it to be a much shorter list.
“We were hoping Gold would mean something significant at HP’s top table and having six or eight partners would have meant more to us.”
However, Stewart Hayward, commercial director at WStore, said the introduction of Gold was essentially an attempt by HP to thin its base of top-tier partners.
The 100 Preferred partners that did not make the grade will no longer receive pay for results (PfR) and partner development funds (PDF), while Gold partners will obtain similar benefits to last year, he stressed.
But Hayward welcomed the fact that HP had, for the first time, linked PDFs with specific specialisations, rather than awarding a flat PDF across the board.
For instance, Gold partners selling workstations will net an extra 1.25 per cent PDF, but just 0.45 per cent for office printing solutions.
“If 151 firms made the criteria, they deserve to be there,” he added. “Beyond that, there is a raft of specialisations that can be achieved, so there is still room for differentiation.”
Dave Poskett, UK director of Solutions Partner Organisation at HP, said: “There is always a balance in terms of where you set the threshold and how you manage it. We will take on board the comments and see if we need to evolve it,” he said.
Loay Lawrence, commercial director at HP Gold partner Vohkus, said: “It is not only about being a Gold partner, but what accreditations you hold, so we have used Gold to differentiate ourselves from others.”
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