Dell EMC's APJ regional channel chief, Tian Beng Ng, has explained how the company will merge its two partner programs while protecting legacy partners' competitive advantages.
The two partner programs will become one on 1 February, the first day of Dell's financial year. EMC's financial year ended on 31 December.
The company has promised to "status match" the program tiers from partners of both legacy programs into its new scheme, which has four tiers.
- Dell EMC Titanium (Dell Premier Plus, EMC Platinum)
- Dell EMC Platinum (Dell Premier, EMC Gold)
- Dell EMC Gold: (Dell Preferred, EMC Silver)
- Dell EMC Authorised (Dell Registered, EMC Authorised)
Partners that previously belonged to both legacy programs would receive whichever status was higher, Beng Ng confirmed.
Dell EMC also offers a Titanium Black status, which is an invite-only level at the top of the Titanium tier. Only "a very small number" of any Australian partners will qualify for the tier, Dell EMC's ANZ channel chief, Geoff Wright, said.
He added that Dell EMC did not plan to publish names of Titanium Black partners. Even if it wanted to, the roster of these top partners won’t be known until after the end of Dell's financial year, when the company can assess partners' financial performance.
Wright added that even securing a position in the Titanium tier would be a major achievement. "Titanium is a high level for partners who are absolutely committed to Dell EMC and have been kicking the goals," said Wright.
Partners had sounded some wariness over the status match. One possible wrinkle was over legacy EMC partners getting access to special pricing and rebates for commodity Dell equipment. One Dell partner told CRN that the advantage wouldn’t necessarily work the other way, because the complexity of selling high-end EMC storage meant most legacy Dell partners wouldn't be equipped to sell it, even if they were offered special pricing.
Wright said that "it doesn't work that way".
"The rebate programs, which will be released in that first week of our new financial year, reward partners for their certification lines of business. Client is a different line of business from compute and storage," he said.
"We're actually able to work with the partners to reward their investment and commitment in each of those areas. Obviously the best thing is to get our partners as certified as possible, both for their benefit and our benefit and for the customer's benefit."
One local partner told CRN that while there had been some initial reservations over the merged program, it seemed like Dell EMC had listened to feedback from its channel community.
Channel restructure
Wright was revealed as Dell EMC channel leader for Australia and New Zealand in December. Beng Ng was appointed senior vice president and general manager for the Asia-Pacific and Japan channel in November, reporting to John Byrne, president, global channels at Dell EMC, who landed the role in July 2016. Mark Fioretto and Angela Fox were named Dell EMC enterprise lead and commercial lead, respectively, in September.
Dell EMC's vice president of global channels and alliances, Cheryl Cook, recently signalled a worldwide shakeup of its distributors, however, Wright confirmed, local disties would not be affected.
"There have been a number of different reviews going on of our different channel strategies as we come together," he said. "The great news is that in Australia, we didn't need to go through review process. We already met all the requirements with our three distributors, which are Dicker Data, Avnet and Ingram Micro, and Ingram in New Zealand. So we're carrying on as before."
Dell EMC assessed its distributors country by country, Beng Ng added. "You look at the local industry or local situation. I think in Australia, we're pretty happy with the way we have it in terms of our distributor relationships and we definitely want to keep it consistent and continue."
Avnet and Ingram were legacy EMC and Dell distributors, while Dicker was only appointed as a Dell partner in July 2016. The Sydney-headquartered distributor currently does not supply legacy EMC products, but this is expected to change over time.
"Over time, they will be onboarded into that program. We look at our channel as a single channel," said Wright.
Clarification: Story updated to show that Titanium Black is not a tier but part of the Titanium tier.
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