Microsoft changes CSP program to reward services sales

Microsoft has signaled significant changes to its Cloud Solution Provider program, effective October 2019, with the aim of rewarding partners that sell services around Azure.

As explained in a new post by Devesh Satyavolu, Microsoft’s director for worldwide partner revenue and growth programs, “The largest opportunity for partners is providing value-added services  … with the highest margins coming from managed services; specialised business application development and deployment; and projects that require planning, implementation, integration, security, and compliance."

The changed CSP program appears designed to help partners get into the services business. Hence a new “CSP services managed discount” that Satyavolu said “rewards partners who provide services on Azure to customers.”

The discount “will replace the current transactional margin for Azure in the Cloud Solution Provider program. It will be given through a discount on the Azure CSP invoice to partners who are billed by Microsoft and are associated to the customer’s CSP Azure estate via admin access.”

There’ll also be a single pricelist in just one currency – US dollars, which Satyavolu said “will allow for a more transparent and simplified pricing reference, regardless of how the customer buys Azure from Microsoft.”

New tools are on the way to manage this process and migrate customers to the new plans. Those tools are promised for mid-2020.

There’s also some new legalese to digest: as of 1 September, the Microsoft Partner Agreement will replace the Microsoft Cloud Reseller Agreement (MCRA) and Microsoft Cloud Distributor Agreement (MCDA). From 1 October the Microsoft Customer Agreement will begin to replace the Microsoft Cloud Agreement for all customers served through the Cloud Solution Provider program.

Microsoft’s current CSP program will run alongside this new one deep into 2020.

The company’s also promised to explain this all with more than a blog post at its Inspire conference in mid-July 2019.

Media aren’t invited to that event, but CRN Australia will do its very best to get as much detail as possible before and after the event.