Druva to Revamp Partner Program, Taps Cohesity Vet as Channel Leader
The channel veteran, who replaces Robert Brower, previously led Druva rival Cohesity’s partner program.
May 5, 2023
![Druva partners get program revamp Druva partners get program revamp](https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/blt10e444bce2d36aa8/bltc919683f88a6a5b5/6523fc937c71d365c01f2a7b/Revamp.jpg?width=700&auto=webp&quality=80&disable=upscale)
Shutterstock
CF: How do you feel about Druva’s Dell relationship?
Druva’s Mike Houghton: Many of our competitors in this market have alliances, partnerships, and we’re no different. But Dell is a very strategic partnership for us. Obviously, we play a pivotal role in their backup solution, and how we go to market together. Our alliance partnership with Dell has been and will continue to be a big part of our go-to-market.
CF: But aren’t you also competing with Dell’s Apex offering?
MH: I guess in some way, you could say that, but we don’t have a lot of channel conflict from what I can see in how we go to market with them. Traditionally, they’re going to be a little bit more on the upper midmarket, large enterprise space. We’re more into that midsize business, and maybe down. So there’s a nice way we differentiate there. But we try to make sure that when we are going to market with Dell, just like we would any other partner, we go through the classic deal-reg process to make sure that we try to keep that channel conflict or that conflict between the two companies to a very small minimum.
CF: One of the topics that’s been discussed over the years is the fact that you run your platform exclusively on AWS. Do you plan to expand to explore expanding to Microsoft Azure or Google Cloud?
MH: We are continuing to foster our relationship with AWS. They’re a very important partnership for us, not only from a go to market through their partner ecosystem, but also, it’s the foundation of our product today. What I would say is the opportunity for that expansion probably exists, and there could be future announcements, but nothing that I’m willing to get into at this point.
CF: What kind of efforts are you developing to help generate more growth?
MH: First, we are launching a whole new channel partner program that will be coming out within the next 30-45 days that will offer a lot more simplicity and further investments in our partners. Number two is we’ve added some strength to the team. We’ve had a few different hires at the leadership level that I think are going to bring some great strength to the organization. Number three is that we are spending a lot of time making sure that we are prioritizing which partners we go to market with.
CF: In what way are you prioritizing?
MH: We want to put more energy behind and focus on the partners that we’ve got good alignment with. We want to make sure that we have the right plans, and then make sure they are the right investments, and we want to make sure we have the right team around them. And we think about these partnerships not only from a regional point of view, but potentially a national or global point of view. Like any organization, you’re going to have that pyramid of life that every sales leader is going to have to basically distinguish how we’re going to support our partners.
CF: Does that mean you are going to reduce the number of partners you focus on?
MH: It does not mean that we’re not going to support all of our partners, it just means that we’re going to look for ways to make sure that those we have the right alignment with we put the right investments and the right resources behind. And I think that will be a key differentiator for our future. I would also say we are bringing in a nice sales mentality to the partner organization, where we’re going to be thinking a lot longer term. I’m asking the team to think about what the plans are two and three years out versus how, like many organizations, we can get really stuck on this quarter or this month. Sometimes you get so stuck on that, that, but haven’t really thought about how to accelerate the growth.
CF: In terms of your better producing partners, so to speak, what type of partners have proven to be the most strategic of partners? Are they those who provide managed services? Are they integrators?
MH: It’s across the board. The MSP route has shown great success. This provider space is one that I think has big upside and has already been producing some nice results. I want to continue to focus there. AWS on the overall cloud go-to-market play is a big opportunity for us, and we’ll continue to focus there. And I think the traditional VAR space — and we have national, global and regional partners that I think are also playing nicely. And in a lot of those, as you probably know, have morphed their definitions.
CF: What can you say about the new partner program that you’re rolling out next month?
MH: We’re going to be enhancing our overall spend around marketing. We’re going to be upgrading our enablement, category, skills and how we can certify and train our partners. We’re going to be doing a better job at partner programs regarding how we build a plan together on where we want this relationship to go. And then ultimately, I think the entanglement with our own sales team and leadership team, we’re going to put a lot of focus on making sure that we do a lot of people mapping and making sure that we’ve got the right folks tied in so we’re going to work. And we’re also going to have some fundamental things like an upgrade our portal. It’s really around investments and simplicity in our programs.
CF: What is the rollout plan for this new program. Will you just be announcing it next month?
MH: We have a phased rollout. There are pieces that will take a little longer to put in place than others. But we will start the rollout in the June time frame. And we will have a continuum of different updates along the way.
CF: What is the rollout plan for this new program. Will you just be announcing it next month?
MH: We have a phased rollout. There are pieces that will take a little longer to put in place than others. But we will start the rollout in the June time frame. And we will have a continuum of different updates along the way.
SaaS backup and recovery provider Druva has reorganized its worldwide channel organization, tapping industry veteran Mike Houghton as senior VP of global partners and alliances. Druva partners should expect to oversee an expansion to of the company’s Compass Partner Program, which it will launch next month.
Druva’s Mike Houghton
Houghton, who was channel leader at Druva rival Cohesity for two years, replaces Robert Brower. Brower, a longtime Commvault exec, had previously joined Druva as VP of operations and chief of staff to Druva founder and CEO Jaspreet Singh. A year later, Druva tapped Brower to lead its partner organization. While he launched Druva’s MSP program at the time, Brower was better known for his operations skills.
“He took on this role to fulfill a need that the organization had with the idea that there would be some type of time frame where he would go on to another role,” Houghton told Channel Futures. Houghton said Druva is committed to its go-to-market alliance with Dell and its partnership with AWS, which hosts Druva’s SaaS-based data protection platform.
We sat down with Houghton for an in-depth conversation.
Channel Futures: Why did you decide to join Druva?
Mike Houghton: I was very interested in the product. It is an incredibly untold solution, being 100%, SaaS and with a go to market via the cloud, which I think is a big advantage. It’s a big differentiator, and an opportunity for us to tell that story.
CF: What is that untold story that Druva partners need to know?
MH: All of our competitors primarily have an on-premises solution trying to get to the cloud — trying to get to a pure, SaaS play. And we have been exclusively SaaS since the day we were born. In my mind, we have a five-to-10-year advantage over most of our competitors as a pure SaaS play, that they are trying to catch up to. We can take the knowledge and that capability we’ve built over more than a decade to market and differentiate how we go to market with our customers, because most people are looking for an easier solution. I’ll use the [phrase] “plug-and-play” solution. It’s easy to deploy, it’s easy to consume, it’s easy to use, and as we hear from most of our customers and partners, it just works.
Druva partners will want to read the rest of our Q&A with Houghton in the slideshow above.
Want to contact the author directly about this story? Have ideas for a follow-up article? Email Jeffrey Schwartz or connect with him on LinkedIn. |
About the Author(s)
You May Also Like