Symantec will slowly dismantle the Platinum, Gold and Silver tiers of its partner programme and instead begin classifying partners based on their skills around specific technologies.

The new "solution-specialist" channel approach is designed to reward partners that invest heavily in certain parts of Symantec’s enterprise portfolio.

The model will begin to be phased in across EMEA over the next 12 months, and globally from next year. It will not encompass Symantec’s more mature products such as its anti-virus and Backup Executive offerings.

Jason Ellis, vice president of EMEA channels and mid-market at Symantec, said the current set-up does not allow partners to present themselves as specialists.

He told CRN: “The transition will happen this year. We will do it delicately and respect the investment partners have made in the old system. But fundamentally we will be moving to a solution specialist-type model.”

Partners that make the highest investment in a given solution area will be dubbed Masters.

Ellis stressed that Symantec is still fine-tuning the strategy. For more details, see the next issue of CRN.