“We need to empower our partners in the changing dynamics to address new opportunities”

The IT multi-national EMC has recently decided to change its partner  program from Velocity to Business Partner Program. Reports suggest that EMC is leaping from its platform 2 to platform 3--social media, analytics, big data and cloud, but Fred Kohout, vice president of EMC’s global partner marketing, refrains from using this term and cautions to not make it black and white. DQ Channels recently spoke to him and found out the features of the new program. Edited excerpts:

What is the reason for large scale channel overhaul?

The fundamental reason was to reflect the dramatic changes that are underway in the IT industry. There are new ways of delivery of  IT services; workloads and applications being built and therefore, we needed to empower our partners in this changing dynamics.

How different it is from the previous program--known as velocity and often referred as platform2--from the new Business Partner Program (BPP)?

Let us not couple Velocity with platform 2 and BPP with platform 3. We need program which allows partners to compete and win in the traditional storage market. But then we also need a program which  gives the flexibility to evolve to address the new opportunities. The Velocity program for the last 10 years was very VAR oriented; transactional oriented--product focused. It was a good program  but doesn’t comprehend the larger picture: Flexibility, choice and services and solutions focused.

Are all federated companies of EMC like VMware and others,part of the BPP.

No those are separate companies. All of our partners do not overlap.

Explain about the features of BPP?

It is designed in collaboration with EMC partners and the new EMC Business Partner Program unifies all EMC partner programs under one umbrella program. It rewards partners who build deep and broad investments across EMC, its federation of companies and VCE. It shifts focus to bring high-value solutions and services to market with partners. It also features new, richer incentives and deeper investments in go-to-market enablement with Cloud Service Providers and Global Alliance partners.

How does a partner benefit?

With this partner program in place,  partners can choose the tracks that best fit their strategic objectives. These tracks are: resell, distribution, cloud service provider, solution provider among others. Also partners in multiple tracks can use dollars earned as well as training credits in one track across other tracks for maximum flexibility. As a partner you are aligned with all EMC’s strategy go to market solutions. It means that a partner will leverage on EMC’s intellectual property investments, all of our sales investments, all of our demand creation. Is even lined up with of our federation.

When does BPP goeslive in India?

You can’t just turn the lights on with partners. You got to give them some time, let them adjust and make investments when they are ready. We have announced this in May and then we are going to meet partners and get their point of view. It goes live in January 2015.

How is the reaction so far from the partner community on the program?

An overwhelming majority have liked it, according to the survey conducted by a third party.

What about training for partners?

There are training and accreditation that are available today and the partners are  using it.

Interview was taken by Abhishek Angad, Correspondent, DQ Channels and The DQ Week.