Cisco's ThousandEyes moves to 100% channel model
‘Goldilocks’ acquisition of ThousandEyes will give new subscription-based recurring revenues to partners, Cisco channel bosses claim
Cisco's ThousandEyes business is moving to a 100 per cent channel sales model, Cisco has announced today.
The networking giant acquired ThousandEyes in May 2020, during the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, in a deal reportedly worth almost $1bn.
The acquisition, which was negotiated entirely virtually, added SaaS-based network infrastructure monitoring, application troubleshooting and internet performance mapping to Cisco's portfolio.
Speaking to CRN, Cisco's EMEAR partner lead, Elisabeth De Dobbeleer, said that ThousandEyes' switch to 100 per cent channel comes at a time when Cisco's managed services partners are "more critical than ever before."
"Trends started before the pandemic, but were accelerated during the pandemic, that shifted routes to market," she said.
"As much as resell is still the biggest part of our partner business, managed services is fast and exponentially growing. So for us the ability to work with, adapt and design our portfolio to that type of partner and more specifically managed services is really critical. And for that reason this announcement is very important," she said.
As of today, all new ThousandEyes customers will go through Cisco's Global Price List (GPL) and enterprise agreements (EA) which go straight to partners.
At the same time, when existing ThousandEyes customers are up for renewal, they will be renewed through Cisco's GPL.
"We were a tiny company prior [to being acquired by Cisco] and now we have 22,000 sellers in Cisco we can leverage," ThousandEyes CRO Michael Reid told CRN.
"With this massive channel we can access through Cisco, this is a huge differentiation and the evolution of ThousandEyes," he added.
Partners will be able to earn additional rebates for revenue that comes through ThousandEyes through Cisco's VIP programme, Reid added.
Furthermore, partners can earn an additional rebate through Cisco's Lifecycle Incentive (LCI) programme if they successfully activate one of 17,000 customers that are entitled turn on ThousandEyes.
Commenting on ThousandEyes' switch to a channel-only model, BT's director of Digital Workplace, Andrew Small, said: "For us it's a positive. The key for us is keeping the innovation of ThousandEyes and the power of the product but give us the ease of doing business that we get when we work with a partner like Cisco.