Cloud Channel Summit: 5 Partner Trends to Watch

By samdizzy

At Cloud Channel Summit 2013 (Nov. 4, Mountain View, Calif.), distributors, telcos and cloud services providers (CSPs) will gather to discuss the latest recurring revenue strategies and business opportunities for channel partners. Here are seven trends and themes Talkin’ Cloud will be tracking.

1. Distributors Go Beyond Cloud Aggregation: Ingram Micro Cloud, Tech Data TDcloud and Synnex CloudSolv have good mind share with channel partners. In Ingram’s case, the company has largely led the Cloud Aggregator conversation — giving parters a platform from which to select and activate multiple cloud offerings.

But Avnet Technology Solutions has offered a slightly different approach to the conversation. Tim FitzGerald, VP of data center and cloud technology solutions, has built the Avnet Cloud Ready program for partners. VARs and integrators can plug in for education and/or tap into relationships with Amazon Web Services, Peak Colo, Savvis and SherWeb. FitzGerald will share his updated views on the cloud maret during the conference.

2. PaaS for Partners?: Generally speaking, most VARs begin their cloud journey with SaaS and perhaps some IaaS. But where does Platform as a Service (PaaS) fit into the conversation? A roundtable discussion, including Corent Technology, SoftServe, Oracle, Google and Progress Software Corp. will explore this topic.

3. New Market Opportunities?: An interesting mix of companies — AppDirect, Box, Cloud Foundry, Comcast Business Services and Cox Communications — will weigh in here. The AppDirect story is a particularly interesting one. The company offers a cloud service marketplace and management platform — which could emerge as a central management dashboard for VARs and cloud integrators.

4. Is SaaS King Partner Centric?: Salesforce.com, ranked atop our Top 100 Cloud Services Providers (CSP) list for 2013, certainly has plenty of ISV (independent software vendor) relationships. But how many VARs and cloud integrators are working with the company? Perhaps Ron Huddleston, senior VP of ISVs and Channels,can offer updates.

5. IaaS Profit Margins?: Infrastructure as a service has serious momentum in the IT channel (check our Top 100 CSP report for the data). But how can partners actually generate some profit margins when IaaS providers cut prices every few months? A panel involving Savvis/CenturyLink, Equinix, Amazon Web Services, ViaWest and HP may offer answers.

Talkin’ Cloud will offer additional updates on Nov. 4 as the conferece unfolds.