Trend Micro in SMB recruitment drive

Anti-virus vendor, Trend Micro has initiated a reseller recruitment drive to feed its strong growth rates in the SMB market.

Dave Patnaik, Trend Micro's director of small and medium business A/NZ said the market for SMB-centric security products is heating up with more of these companies recognising the need for security but lacking the IT staff to manage enterprise-sized rollouts.

“Our channel program provides partners at all levels with opportunities to access joint marketing funds, gain revenue through maintenance program sales and gain financial reward through sales referrals,” he said.

The company recently reported a 17 percent increase in revenue for its second quarter as well as strong growth in the SMB segment in the US.

However, Nick Verykios, marketing director Firewall Systems and former Trend distributor said the vendor needs to give a reason for channel partners to move from one vendor to another.

“The SMB sector is a big sector and everyone wants to sell anti-virus products to these companies,” he said.

“However if the vendor or even the distributor doesn’t have the tight model then the vendor’s products are just another anti-virus product.

“It’s one thing to say to these resellers we want you to sell our products but another to actually give them a reason to drop their current vendor.”

Verykios said the key factor for the SMB sector is having a service model behind the product offering. “We were building an SMB services model with Trend Micro, but nothing eventuated from that.”

Trend Micro posted consolidated net sales of US$175 million, operating income of US$46.8 million and net income of US$26.5 million during the quarter.

Although revenue grew 17 percent, operating income dropped two percent compared to the same period last year.