Dell EMC Partner Programme launches today
Partners still in the dark on revenue thresholds for now but Dell EMC executives beam about new scheme
The Dell EMC Partner Programme formally launched today, with execs claiming partners have two "paths" to pursue in order to win a place on each tier. However, details of the revenue thresholds required to do so remain under wraps for now.
The new-look partner programme officially went live on Monday, but further details came out as part of a wider launch this morning. CRN understands that partners will be informed later today of the crucial information about revenue requirements to achieve each tier.
A video of Dell Technologies boss Michael Dell was released to mark today's occassion too, in which he said the channel matters "very much to me personally".
The new partner programme has been in the making since September, when Dell's landmark acquisition of EMC closed. Partners have been "status matched" so far, meaning that for the first year in the programme, their tier status will be determined on how they did last year in the legacy partner programmes. But for next year, they will have to adhere to new standards which are as yet to be laid out.
Speaking to CRN ahead of the launch, Dell EMC's EMEA boss Michael Collins said he could not divulge this information, but did say partners will get two cracks of the whip to achieve their desired tier - training and sales.
In the new programme, countries across the world will be divided into groups according to their size, and specific requirements for each group will apply to them. There are two "buckets" of countries in EMEA, Collins said, with the UK falling into the one for larger countries.
Within that bucket, there will be two ways Dell EMC partners can achieve a place on their desired tier.
"We want to make sure partners that are big in smaller countries can reach the highest tiers," Collins told CRN. "Within those two buckets, there are two paths into the programme. To put it simply, one is focused on certification - a high level of certification and a low revenue threshold; and the other one is a higher revenue threshold and a lower level of certification. Everything around the programme will be aligned to those.
"The training that is expected of them on the lower revenue thresholds will be much higher and aimed at partners in the datacentre where we have a desire for them to sell across the portfolio and obviously be able to provide customers with a partner infrastructure they require. If you look at that, we're giving partners across countries the flexibility now - size versus certification. We think that's really valuable."
Collins added that the rationale behind the move is to ensure that smaller, but extremely dedicated and specialist partners, won't miss out as part of the new programme.
"Not all partners are selling huge volume including all lines of business," he said. "Many of them are datacentre companies - SMB integrators who are not focused on volume. When I say volume, I don't mean that in a crude way. It's just not a huge revenue number. This is to make sure we recognise partners who are highly certified and are working with customers on this digital transformation. On the other hand, there are very large partners who are slightly more transactional and do a lot of large client real estate rollouts to very large customers, so they are less focused on the datacentre. They may not be doing converged infrastructure, for example."
Keep an eye on CRN for further details on the Dell EMC revenue requirements as and when they are unveiled.