Cisco looks to drive sales for elite Cloud partners
Vendor crowns first Master Cloud Builders as it implores smaller VARs to get on board with reselling services
Cisco is to certify an elite band of Cloud Builder partners in the UK and has created a marketplace to help them drive sales and ramp up recruitment of Cloud Resellers.
The vendor's Master Cloud Builder badge goes live today, having been trailed at its worldwide partner summit in April. One of the first UK and Ireland partners to be accredited is ANS Group. The launch of the top-level certification comes two years after Cisco launched its cloud channel scheme, featuring three levels: Reseller, Provider and Builder.
Jim DeHaven, Cisco's UKI director for datacentre and virtualisation, told ChannelWeb that the vendor has signed up as many Cloud Builders as it feels necessary in this country. But, at the lower end, he called on more VARs to branch into the cloud by reselling packaged services.
"As we see an increase in Cloud Providers, one of the more underserved areas is the Cloud Reseller market," he said. "There are some small to medium-sized partners who do not want to make an investment to build the proposition [that we want to sign up]."
Master Cloud builders will benefit from the exclusive usage of the newly launched Cisco Cloud Partner Marketplace, an online sales portal which will allow end user customers to search for partners by region and expertise. VARs can also use the tool to find an appropriate fellow partner to collaborate with and back off services outside their expertise.
"It is the first time we have ever done anything like this, which shows how clearly we are differentiating [in the cloud arena]," said DeHaven. "We are taking a different approach, building a marketplace of cloud providers as opposed to Cisco going and becoming a cloud provider. That is quite a differentiator.
"It is a partner-centric cloud strategy as much as it has been a partner-centric resale strategy."
Masters of the universe?
Since the launch of the first Master badges in 2007, some Cisco partners have appeared ambivalent about the worth of attaining the accreditation, while some that have pursued them have indicated that they serve to differentiate them more in the eyes of Cisco than end users. But DeHaven insisted the latest gong "is less about Cisco differentiation than it is about customers".
He added that the vendor has worked hard to ensure cloud success by ensuring it gets the rewards right for its high-touch sales teams.
"One of the things we do is review the incentive programmes on pretty much an annual basis," he explained. "It is less about the incentive plan for the channel as the incentive plan for our high-touch account managers to ensure they are selling with the partners on a service as opposed to a product resale."
Paul Sweeney, managing director of ANS Group, said: "This highly respected Cisco accreditation will provide a significant marketing and business differentiation for Cisco and ANS Group as a partner, enabling us to clearly communicate and position ourselves as a sector leading cloud provider."