IronPort determined to keep channel size down

Vendor pledges to maintain margins for its channel after Cisco acquisition completed

IronPort intends to keep its channel small to maintain margins despite finally being acquired by Cisco last week.

Earlier this year the networking giant announced its intention to acquire IronPort for $830m, with a view to extending its Self-Defending Network strategy. The deal was finalised last week (CRN Online, 25 June) and will see IronPort operate as a separate unit within the main company.

Danny Driscoll, partner sales manager at IronPort, which also ditched its distribution strategy this year (CRN, 5 March), told CRN: “We have had a trickle of enquiries from Cisco partners about our channel programme, but ours is still a very specialist sale and there are relatively few Cisco partners that are specialist enough. I am very confident that going forward we will still have a very small channel in the UK.”

He added that the firm is keen to push further into the SME space. “IronPort has never traditionally operated in that space, but it’s one of the fastest growing areas for Cisco , so we are looking to jump on the back of that success,” he said.

“The benefit of a smaller channel allows us to limit availablility to a smaller group of resellers, which means we have a better chance of keeping margins high.”