FUTURE TECHNOLOGY
RIVERBED
Riverbed
SteelConnect
to become fast
track for channel
partners
D
uring 2017, Riverbed actioned
clearly defined strategic objectives
which included realigning and
doubling down on sales efforts, further
strengthening ties with distributors, and
enablement of the channel. This allowed
the vendor to extend conversations with
existing clients through cross-selling
across their portfolio as well as making
inroads into new geographies and market
verticals. Riverbed has been successful in
penetrating industry verticals including
government, defence, finance, oil and gas
and, recently, the retail sector.
Scorecard
Two years ago, Riverbed began to engage
with customers to help them understand
that optimising their applications and
troubleshooting performance in complex
hybrid IT environments requires visibility
not only into the network, but also into
the application layer and even end-user
experience. This was a new approach and
required investing time and resources
into educating the market. Riverbed has
begun to reap the rewards of those efforts
with Riverbed SteelCentral portfolio a
fundamental pillar of its business in the
region. Learning from this, Riverbed
has begun to conduct similar awareness
programmes around SD-WAN and its
SteelConnect solution. As per Riverbed’s
global survey, 93% of businesses intend to
implement this technology within the next
four years. As a true provider of SD-WAN,
this represents a significant opportunity
for Riverbed, so long as Riverbed lays the
necessary groundwork now.
Opportunity
Riverbed is extremely positive going
into 2018. Today, businesses run on
applications, and the vendor’s ability to
address the performance, visibility and
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control of applications, whether they are
based on-premises or in the cloud, makes
it relevant to all market segments.
Every enterprise is a potential customer
for Riverbed and Riverbed will penetrate
new accounts by first addressing their
pressing need for end-to-end visibility
with SteelCentral. Once Riverbed has
demonstrated its ability to solve some of the
greatest IT challenges organisations face,
Riverbed can showcase the value of the
other products in its portfolio, which are
designed to tightly integrate into a holistic
platform for application performance. ◊
Two years ago, Riverbed
began to engage with
customers to help
them understand that
optimising applications
requires visibility into
the network, and also
application layer and
end-user experience.
VEEAM
Veeam driving cloud and services
stack for channel partners
T
his year Veeam enhanced its
Veeam Cloud Service Provider
programme to allow such partners
to differentiate themselves in the Cloud
marketplace. The company also introduced
a new Veeam Accredited Service Partner
programme that enables its members to
deliver high-quality professional services
related to Veeam solutions.
This helps customers realise increased
reliability, along with greater value and
return of investment of their investments
in Veeam. Veeam will also be making
improvements for key Platinum and Gold
partners shortly, around rebates and
VMCE training.
Scorecard
Last year was a big year for Veeam and
the vendor brought new opportunities
to the market. Veeam delivered agents
for physical servers and also end
points, which dramatically increases
Veeam’s addressable market. Veeam
also announced Version 10 with new
announcements and features, support
for Nutanix, IBM storage and NAS, plus
a joint venture to extend software to IBM
AIX and Solaris UNIX servers.
Veeam Console was significantly
improved very recently to allow
customers to manage physical and virtual
environments through one pane of glass.
Veeam also signed reseller agreements
with HPE, Cisco and NetApp so partners
of these three major vendors can sell
Veeam together as a complete solution.
Growth
Availability remains the key driving force.
Most organisations want to have their
information available to customers and
employees 24x7x365. Veeam also sees
cloud adoption about to take off in this
region. Every Veeam customer with an
on-premise solution will be able to use
cloud services from Microsoft and Amazon
as well as other local cloud providers. The
only real issue has been cash flow and
budgets. However, the outlook for next
year appears to be bright in key markets
such as Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi.
Forecast
2018 will see more focus on cloud and
software especially security and those
partners who invest in services.
Veeam signed reseller
agreements with HPE,
Cisco, NetApp, so
partners of these three
major vendors can sell
Veeam together as a
complete solution.
Issue 14
INTELLIGENT TECH CHANNELS