Palo Alto tips balance towards smaller partners

Firewall vendor outlines NextWave 2.0 partner programme as it unveils first quarterly results since IPO

Palo Alto Networks has rebooted its partner programme to help smaller resellers close more sales.

The next-generation firewall vendor, which yesterday posted an 88 per cent spike in quarterly sales, outlined its NextWave 2.0 partner programme to 120 of its assembled partners in Lisbon (pictured) this week.

Talking to ChannelWeb, vice president of EMEA Karl Driesen revealed the four-tier scheme still contains revenue gates – ranging from $3m (£1.9m) for Diamond to $100,000 for Silver – but has a greater emphasis on components relating to technical ability.

"Smaller partners may not have the capacity, but from a quality point of view can still make a difference," he said. "In return, we should be enabling them to get to a higher level of the programme."

Partners will be judged on their ability to develop business, implement solutions and to maintain and offer professional services for those solutions, said Driesen.

NextWave 2.0 also offers a more generous 20 per cent discount to partners who register deals, a development that Driesen said would help smaller partners and mark Palo out from its competition, which includes Check Point, Cisco and Fortinet.

Driesen said the changes, particularly the deal registration element, were driven by partner feedback.

According to Gartner, 35 per cent of internet connections will be secured by NGFs by the end of 2014, with 60 per cent of new purchases being NGFs by that time.

Palo, which raised $299.5m in July through its initial public offering, claims to have spearheaded the NGF market.

Driesen said: "We have seen Gartner confirming multiple times that we are the leader and by far the biggest innovator in that space.

"[The IPO] shows both our partners and end users how committed we are to remaining an independent company leading in the network security space."

For its fiscal fourth quarter, the Santa Clara-based vendor saw sales bulge 88 per cent to $75.6m, although net losses hit $4.6m.