Author: Nick Farrell

IBM expands PartnerWorld programme

Biggish Blue has expanded its Business Partner programme to give its partners greater flexibility and help develop new revenue streams as businesses continue to shift to the cloud.

The PartnerWorld programme now features two new tailored, specialised tracks – Build and Service – alongside its existing Sell pathway. IBM says the addition of these new tracks aligns the company with the growing trend of partners shifting and expanding their models to better compete in a market driven by cloud adoption.

As it continues to enhance its Systems portfolio with IBM Cloud, the company’s multi-cloud approach will also deliver greater overall agility, it added, as well as the ability to bridge mission-critical applications on IBM Z, Power and Storage systems.

Channel is bouncing back

Beancounters at Context have added up some numbers and reached the conclusion that the channel has already started to show signs of bouncing back.

The outfit said that after looking at its four-week rolling average for year on year revenue sales growth climbing from minus ten per cent in week 16 to an increase of 4.6 percent in week 17, outperforming 2019 figures for the same period of minus 1.9 percent .

The analyst house highlighted is expecting second quarter numbers to come in with a 4.1 percent decline after a robust first quarter had delivered 4.8 percent increases.

Nutanix UK and European staff will be hit by coronavirus cutbacks

Nutanix has confirmed it has asked non-US staff to take two weeks’ voluntary unpaid leave as part of wider actions to minimise the fallout from COVID-19.

In the US the outfit has ‘furloughed’ more than 1,400 US staff – which is a quarter of its workforce.

Nutanix said that it has asked staff outside the US to take a total of two weeks of voluntary unpaid leave during the same time period.

Nutanix’s share price crashed in late February as CEO Dheeraj Pandey attributed underwhelming second quarter results to the “murky” environment caused by the pandemic, reasoning it doubled down on when explaining its current actions.

Channel holding together

Beancounters at Context have worked out that the channel has already started to show signs of bouncing back, with the  four-week rolling average for year-on-year revenue sales growth climbing from  to 4.6 percent in week 17, outperforming 2019 figures for the same period of -1.9 percent.The analyst house highlighted that resilience in the channel but is expecting Q2 numbers to come in with a 4.1 percent decline after a robust first quarter had delivered 4.8 percent  increases.

Certain product areas continue to provide the channel with revenue growth opportunities, including: AV systems, mobile and desktop computing, software, and licences.

Recent weeks have also seen demand for warranties and service, ehealth devices, and games consoles. Context is warning that the biggest losers in the second quarter will be telecoms, printing hardware and consumables, displays and infrastructure and security.

Context global managing director Adam Simon, said: “With most of Europe still furloughed, B2B projects have been put on hold, while consumer sentiment is dropping fast as unemployment bites and savings are depleted. However, there are some bright spots. Mobile computing and software will account for nearly €7 billion in revenue in Q2 and computing components are making a turnaround as supply issues ease.”

With the economic problems having been sparked by coronavirus rather than the financial crisis of 2008 he thinks any recession will be short.

 

 

 

 

Outages hit companies hard

IT business needs to look for a new way of working after COVID-19 according to  Comms365. IoT boss. Nick Sacke (pictured).

Sacke said that there were a number of factors organisations should consider when adopting a new way of working following the COVID-19 crisis and organisations need to prepare now to not only adapt to the new way of working, but also “future proof” their businesses for life post-lockdown .

“The COVID-19 crisis initiated a dramatic change to the working world almost overnight. With offices closed and employees advised to work from home, businesses were forced into adopting mass remote working without warning. Moreover, with many organisations in many industries forced to furlough employees and close, they have had to rapidly transform business models in order to maintain operational continuity and cash flow, be that through moving to online models or changing their business offerings completely”, Sacke said.

Tanium appoints Hitachi bloke as global head of partner sales

Security outfit Tanium has appointed Todd Palmer as the new global head of partner sales. Palmer will head up the firm’s indirect “go-to-market” (GTM) strategy.

Palmer will drive sales of Tanium’s partner revenue, while Vice President of Global Alliances and Channels Tom Herrmann will drive “deep integrations” and “go-to-market” ploys with advisories/system integrators, cloud providers and technology companies. 

Arrow Electronics announces EMEA distribution agreement with Cyren

Arrow Electronics has entered into an EMEA distribution agreement with cloud security solutions provider Cyren to distribute its cloud-based internet security products.

Atif Ahmed, vice president of sales, Cyren EMEA said: As the threat from phishing grows, organisations must stay ahead of the weaknesses exposed in their corporate email systems. Phishing is still an enormous headache for CIOs and email systems provide an increasingly porous method for breaching an organisation’s security.”

Vmware freezes staff pay and cuts managers’ salaries

VMware  is freezing staff pay and slashing the salaries of its senior management, including chief exec Pat (Kicking)  Gelsinger, to weather the COVID-19 crisis.

Gelsinger, and the company board will  take pay cuts in second and third quarter as part of the measures “to support efforts to manage through the current economic uncertainty”.

A company spokesperson said that the move is part of a “thoughtful and prudent plan designed to address the current uncertainty of the COVID-19 pandemic and the overall economic outlook, while ensuring the company has the skills and talent needed to accelerate growth as the economy stabilises”.

LogicMonitor expands into UK with Atos parternship

Cloudy LogicMonitor  announced the global expansion of its LogicMonitor Partner Network and included Atos as its new UK channel partner.

To capitalise on significant recurring revenue, LogicMonitor Partners can build, integrate, resell and implement its cloud-based platform to effectively monitor hybrid IT environments with end-to-end visibility of applications and services. LogicMonitor’s programme delivers sales and marketing collaboration, training and certification programmes, dedicated partner managers, competitive portfolio differentiation, accelerated onboarding, and automated deal registration. 

Cognizant snaps up Collaborative Solutions

Cloudy outfit Cognizant has today announced it has entered into an agreement to buy Collaborative Solutions, a privately-held global consultancy specialising in Workday enterprise cloud applications for finance and human resources.

The transaction is expected to close in the second quarter of 2020, subject to the satisfaction of certain closing conditions, including regulatory clearance. Financial details were not disclosed.

The company claimed the acquisition of Collaborative Solutions will add new finance and HR advisory and implementation services to Cognizant’s cloud offerings. Collaborative Solutions, one of the world’s largest Workday consultancies, enables clients across financial services, healthcare, technology, government, education, and other organisations to transform their operations using enterprise cloud applications. Services include strategy development, organisational change management, and the deployment and management of finance, HR, planning, and higher education solutions.

Dropbox improves partner programme

Dropbox has announced a number of enhancements to the Dropbox Partner Programme, which have been designed to provide additional benefits to channel resellers and vendors as teams increasingly rely on remote working.

Using the outfit’s Partner Portal, Dropbox partners can access to new products such as Dropbox Spaces and HelloSign and receive improved support options, and a refreshed range of benefits.

Dropbox says the changes will help firms navigate the unprecedented challenges posed by the global COVID-19 pandemic.

O’Mara joins Avast

Security outfit Avast has announced the appointment of Anthony O’Mara as VP Global Sales at Avast Business.

O’Mara joined Avast following a five-year tenure at Malwarebytes where he held the position of Vice President EMEA. Previously, he was VP EMEA at Trend Micro. O’Mara began his career in Finance and Operations and held several VP Finance positions before moving into general management positions.

Exclusive Networks teams up with Tomorrow Street

Exclusive Networks is partnering with Tomorrow Street to provide its companies’ business support and access to its expansive distributions channels.

The pair say that this partnership will also provide Exclusive Networks access to new disruptive technologies and Tomorrow Streets “innovation ecosystem” [new all encompassing system, Ed.].

Kenneth Graham, Tomorrow Street’s CEO, said: “Exclusive Networks and Tomorrow Street have a shared goal to identify innovative startups and work with them to scale their businesses. Tomorrow Street’s ecosystem, combined with Exclusive’s reputation for innovation, go-to-market skills and global distribution channels, will be a huge advantage to help startups scale their tech across the globe.”

Bitdefender appoints Roman VP of EMEA

Insecurity outfit Bitdefender, has named Emilio Roman as Vice President of EMEA sales, to drive the company’s growth objectives.

Roman will be responsible for Bitdefender’s sales strategy and go-to-market execution in EMEA.

A successful executive with more than 20 years of experience leading high-performance global teams, Emilio Roman has broad cybersecurity and cloud industry experience and has successfully led multidisciplinary teams, in the execution of fast scaling business strategies.

Salesforce wants to help firms reopen

Salesforce logoSalesforce  has announced its Work.com site which it says will provide new technology solutions and resources to help business and community leaders around the world reopen safely, re-skill employees and respond efficiently on the heels of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Work.com includes new solutions to accelerate private and public sector response to the COVID-19 pandemic, including employee wellness assessment; shift management; contact tracing; emergency response management; and grants and volunteer management. The Work.com Command Center brings all data streams together so that businesses and communities can make more informed decisions.