Last February, we had the opportunity to meet with a number of our partners to discuss our newest offerings and hear their perspectives on VCE. We take a lot of pride in our extensive partner network and, coming out of those meetings, there was a clear message that our partners wanted more.
We took this request for “more” to heart. Over the past several months, we have put a lot of thought into how we might be able to strengthen our existing partnerships and more easily begin new ones. The result is the VCE™ Partner Program, an enhanced solution-based partner program that we are launching today alongside a host of new products and our vision for “true converged infrastructure.”
As VCE set out to transform IT with a simplified, true converged infrastructure, we also set out to transform our partner program with new opportunities for development, growth, and revenue generation around converged infrastructure solutions. The enhanced program offers new solution provider tiers and specializations, as well as benefits and incentives to both new and existing partners – along with the tools, materials and opportunities they need to succeed and thrive.
So why is the partner program changing? The market for converged infrastructure is experiencing tremendous growth and is transforming rapidly. To expand and capitalize on this market opportunity, VCE is evolving the partner program to help partners quickly develop and grow their converged infrastructure business.
First, we divided the program into three tiers—Authorized, Silver and Gold. The Authorized level makes it easier for new partners to join the program. The Silver and Gold levels recognize and reward existing partners for their investments and for building their business around VCE and its products. We have also enhanced the financial incentives for each tier to help our partners grow revenue and achieve higher levels of profitability, with the added benefits from Cisco and EMC.
To support and enable our solution providers to deliver more advanced applications and services to customers, we are adding specializations to our program. This recognizes solution providers that focus on specific solution areas—such as mission-critical applications, end-user computing, messaging and communications, and professional services—and enables partners to deliver higher value solutions to customers. Specializations will also help partners provide more profitable solutions, accelerate their time to market and reach higher tiers within the VCE Partner Program.
There is also a wide range of enhanced program incentives to further improve partner growth and profitability. This includes new training and sales enablement tools, pre-built marketing campaign materials, lead and demand generation programs, and technical resources – all designed to enable partners to grow their converged infrastructure business.
Existing partners can visit VCE’s new partner portal to learn more about the changes to our channel program. If you’re not already a partner but would like to be, I encourage to you to find out how to join our program.
Our partners asked us for more and we have listened. Just as the true converged infrastructure describes our commitment to customers, our enhanced partner program is meant to drive even more success with our channel partners and their customers.