Bad channel report for Good Technology

Partners accuse MDM vendor of swooping in on registered deals

Good Technology has been accused by resellers of not playing its deal registration programme with a straight bat and being miserly with leads.

The mobile device management (MDM) vendor has a legacy of direct sales but last year launched a channel push to help it cope with the growth it is enjoying on the back of the bring-your-own device boom.

However, multiple top-level partners have chided the vendor for swooping in on registered deals, with one branding the process a "lottery".

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, one said: "You have to register the deal to get full margin, but in doing so you bring the deal to the attention of [its] direct sales team and run the very real and all too often proven risk of them introducing a different partner, or trying to close a deal directly."

The vendor declined to comment when questioned on the issues by ChannelWeb, dismissing the accusations as "unfounded".

The anonymous source added that as well as deal registration issues, Good's partner programme is let down by poor marketing support, claiming that in one year, the vendor has supplied "almost no leads or deals" and branding the partnership "one-way traffic".

Good is widely regarded to have been an MDM trailblazer and is one of only five vendors positioned as a leader in Gartner's magic quadrant for the technology.

Despite admitting that Good's offering is unique, the source warned that its aggressive sales tactics will mean that as soon as another vendor offers a similar technology, most resellers will be "happy to jump ship".

The source added: "Sales performance is great for Good in the UK, and its leadership team is being applauded for that. However, if these leaders were being measured on customer, partner and employee satisfaction, they would probably not be quite so full of themselves. And as we all know, long-term success is based on satisfaction."

Dave Ellis, director of new technology and services at distributor Computerlinks, which recently inked a partnership with rival MDM vendor Mobile Active Defence (MAD), also questioned Good's channel credentials.

He said: "A few of our partners have said that they have had their fingers burned in the past by Good. We chose to work with MAD who have a strong security solution for mobile devices and a channel-centric model."

Not all Good's top partners felt the same, however.

Matthew Helling, network and security manager at Softcat, said that although Good's sales team is "more aggressive than other vendors", he understands that this is due to its rapid growth, and he "cannot fault" the partner programme.

Andy Goddard, practice leader for workplace and software at Computacenter, said that although Good appears to be "building an account team to build higher strategic engagement with customers directly", Computacenter has still been involved in closing deals through Good and has experienced good co-operation with the vendor.