Dell Rolls Out 2023 Partner Program with Addition of Apex+ Category

Amid economic uncertainty that has resulted in weakened IT demand, Dell Technologies is signaling an upbeat tone to its partners. Dell rolled out its 2023 partner program on Monday, emphasizing opportunities for the channel with its Apex managed service offerings.

Dell planned the launch of its new partner program in conjunction with the beginning of its 2024 fiscal year. But it unwittingly coincided with news that Dell is laying off 5% of its workforce due to eroding market conditions. After warning of headwinds back in November, Dell joined a chorus of companies and economists now forecasting prolonged uncertainty.

Nevertheless, in a blog on Monday announcing the new program, channel leader Rola Dagher said she sees opportunities for partners. She emphasized that customers have hybrid work and hybrid cloud, edge and sustainability initiatives.

Dell’s Rola Dagher

“We’re building upon a position of partner strength,” Dagher noted. “In [Dell’s fiscal] Q3 [for the period ending Oct. 31], partners delivered approximately 50% of our overall net revenue, accelerated double-digit storage growth, and helped us secure No. 1 positions in the majority of the industry’s critical IT infrastructure categories.”

Cheryl Cook, senior VP of global partner marketing, echoed a similar tone.

Dell’s Cheryl Cook

“We frankly feel that whether we’re in robust economic times or more uncertain, challenging times, partners have ample opportunity to win and grow with Dell,” Cook told Channel Futures. “We’re focused on the long term and the many opportunities like multicloud, where we’re investing in, and we see huge potential for our partners around 5G and telecom and the overall edge opportunity that we’re continuing to support.”

Partner Program Enhancements

This year’s partner program changes build on the enhancements Dell announced in September to the Apex portfolio. At that time, Dell made Apex available for partners to deliver in 35 countries. Dell also launched new partner-delivered offerings, including Apex Cloud Services with VMware Cloud, Apex Data Storage Services and Apex Private and Hybrid Cloud services.

Cook said Dell is now adding a product category called Apex+ that she described as a simplified, consolidated partner-delivered offering. ‘Via our program, all of our Apex solutions will be both rebates and earned-MDF eligible across the full category of our eligible partners,” Cook said. “It gives partners a consistent view of the rebate incentive eligibility across all of Apex.”

Another addition to the program, partner deployment, lets partners select and deploy Dell Apex solutions with a choice of service delivery options.

“It means a partner can use existing service delivery competencies that they have to be able to deploy, manage and maintain overall control of the Apex deployment for their customers, obviously creating ample opportunity for them to augment and expand with their value-added services. It’s a great opportunity to create more growth potential for our partners,” said Cook.

New Apex Competencies

Dell also is launching a new Apex competency designed to enable partners to become more familiar with the portfolio. Cook said the new competency aims to help partners learn about the expanded offers and maximize the potential earnings and incentive opportunities with the new Apex+ category.

Furthermore, Dell is launching an improved purchasing experience with preconfigured server and storage bundles, which increase pricing transparency and expedites the ability for quotes and shipping.

“It consists of new quoting tools and gives partners the ability to provide more simplified quoting experiences and provides pre-configured bundles of both servers and storage or just velocity opportunity for them in the business, Cook said.

Dell also is adding a new incentive to partners who offer the company’s Asset Recovery Services. Those services provide the disposition of Dell and non-Dell hardware, including PCs, peripherals, servers and other gear. Dell offers the service in compliance with the NIST SP 800-88r1 data protection standard.

While Dell has offered Asset Recovery Services for many years, the company now lets partners resell those services. The program will provide a 7% rebate for Asset Recovery Services partners sell.