Dell’s chief commercial officer, Marius Haas, tipped up at the Canalys Channel Forum today to talk about how it’s vastly extended its channel programmes worldwide.He faced the channel audience like Lenovo’s executives did before.
Haas said that 70 percent of enterprise customers prefer to work through the channel. Of course, at one time, practically all sales were direct. Forty percent of its share is now through the channel and it’s invested $125 million in programmes.
In some countries 100 percent of its business is through the channel, Haas said.
Dell going private has been a catalyst for change, Haas said. It doesn’t have to bother thinking about shareholders now, just customers. Dell now has five and 10 year plans and is thinking long term.
Haas said Dell had made great progress with enterprise customers and talking to distributors about how to win more customers.
Dell now has a two tier distribution model because it gives an opportunity to be more aggressive in terms of customer wins.
Customers he said, aren’t looking for more vendors and would like one vendor to supply software, services and hardware, Haas said. “It’s a holistic conversation,” he said. “In the thin client business it starts with end user experience but very quickly moves to the apps the customer would be running, and what’s the storage system, and what’s the software to manage it.”
Haas said that he wants both direct and indirect business to grow. Channel business is growing faster than direct sales, he said.
Dell has hired senior executives who have channel in their bloodstreams. “Dell is committed to the channel,” he said. Dell will create more opportunities and generate demand for the channel.
