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India's Most Valued Principals
By ChannelWorld Bureau on Dec 24, 2009Perception is reality. And that is more so when it is held by the vendors’ feet on the street, or in other words, the channel partners. So, what do the partners feel? Who are the best vendors to work with? What makes them better? What differentiates them from the competition?
To find out answers to these questions and more, we bring you India’s Most Valued Principals, as rated by the channel partners on critical parameters that drive business growth (see methodology for more details).
In the largest survey of its kind, a total of 296 unique respondents from across the country participated and rated 45 different vendors across 12 categories on six key parameters. Though in the accompanying tables the number of vendors is restricted only to the top five, there were, on an average, seven to eight vendors in each category. And categories in which the vendor concentration is low (essentially monopolies or oligopolies) were not included. Hence, there is no microprocessor, or mainframe, or virtualization category.
Since many solution providers deal in multiple categories and engage with multiple vendors, on an average, each respondent rated vendors in four different categories and rated about two vendors in each category.
Though the scores varied depending on the category, at an aggregate level, partners rated the technology solutions of vendors considerably higher than other parameters like marketing assistance or customer support. At the same time, training and certification was identified by the partners as the weakest parameter for all the vendors.
Looking at the aggregate scores, another interesting observation is the fact that partners in certain categories have rated their principals higher across parameters compared to other categories. For instance, vendors in categories like storage management software, network storage, and network security appliances received higher average scores across parameters, while vendors in categories like desktops & notebooks, servers, wireless networking, and workgroup printers & MFDs, received low average scores.
Going through the responses also highlighted the issue of how some unscrupulous elements try to manipulate these surveys. For instance, MAIA Intelligence was excluded from the survey results when investigations revealed that a total of 37 respondents claiming to represent 37 different partners of MAIA with unique names, telephone numbers, and e-mail ids, and rating MAIA between 8 and 10 on all parameters, were an attempt to manipulate the results in the Business Intelligence category in favor of the company.
As suspected, all these 37 responses came within a span of five hours on Nov 3 from the same IP address! A simple check traced the IP address to Navi Mumbai and a quick conversation with some of those 37 people who were said to have participated confirmed that they had indeed not participated. As the saying goes, there is always one bad apple.
The survey has, however, thrown up some interesting results along with some predictable ones. The top three ranked players in each category are being awarded the Gold, Silver, and Bronze awards respectively. Read on to check out this year’s winners.
Methodology
Methodology
The Channel World Most Valued Principal survey was conducted online during Oct-Nov 2009. Channel partners were invited to rate the performance of vendors in 12 different categories across six key parameters — Technology Solutions, Marketing Assistance, Training & Certification, Customer Support, Financial Terms, and Management styles.
Solution providers were asked to rate the performance of vendors in only those categories that they operated in and rate only those vendors that they worked with. The ratings were on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the highest.
For the overall analysis and ranking, the ratings of only those respondents were taken who disclosed some basic information about themselves like name of the company, their designation, e-mail id, etc. All the ratings of partners who didn’t disclose their identities were ignored for the overall analysis. Besides, on a random basis about 15 percent of the respondents were contacted to verify and validate their ratings.
Since some parameters are more important than others, to objectively calculate the final scores weightages had to be assigned for each of the parameters. So, we asked the winners of our Premier 100 awards to assign weightages for each of these parameters on a scale of 100 (at the same time ensuring that the total of all the weightages equals 100). The weightages assigned by the various Premier 100 winners for each of the parameters were averaged to calculate the final weightage for each parameter.
A final weighted average score was calculated for each vendor in every category by multiplying the average score that a vendor received for each parameter by its respective weightage and adding them up. This weighted average score was later converted to a base of 100.
The ranking of the vendors is based on the final weighted average score. Though the accompanying tables show the rounded off scores in whole numbers (for easy readability), decimals, however, have been taken into account for ranking purposes.
Business Intelligence
Business Intelligence
Microsoft
Business intelligence is a market that has evolved through consolidation. Increasing use of enterprise applications and growing amount of data has been driving this market over the years. As a result, smaller BI players were gradually bought over by the leading players in this segment. India is one of the fastest growing markets for BI and is hence an important target for most of the vendors. Though market positions keep fluctuating, partners did not seem too confused in rating their principals.
Microsoft emerged a winner in the Business Intelligence category by a comparatively small margin. The vendor came out on top in two important parameters - marketing assistance and training & certification – which tipped the scales in its favor.
Srinivas Thiagarajan, Associate Director, eBiz, Intelligroup India, a gold certified partner of Microsoft says that the vendor’s sales and marketing strategies are incomparable. Though the partner works with a few more BI vendors, the whole idea of getting into the BI segment was conceived keeping Microsoft’s partnership in mind.
“We have been working with Microsoft in the BI space for the last seven years. As a principal, they have a lot of focus on end-users and sales strategies. We are also happy with the technical support the vendor has been providing. We even get every-day technical assistance from them. In fact, our relationship has evolved to such a level that we can just pick up the phone and talk to their technical team for any kind of assistance. Their brand value and market acceptance has helped us bag more and more deals. In the BI segment, it’s important to have a smart product positioning and Microsoft is definitely a leader in this,” he adds.
SAP Business Objects, which was a close second, was rated marginally higher in management styles and cemented its position due to its consistent performance across most of the other parameters. Neelesh Pawar, National Manager- Emerging Businesses, Silver Touch Technologies, says, “The team at SAP is very professional and know their job well. We have a very good experience with SAP Business Objects and our customers are happy too. SAP focuses quite a lot on enhancing channel relationships and they take utmost care in regularly communicating with us so I would rate them as a highly channel friendly company.”
IBM, which was rated just marginally behind Microsoft and SAP, was perceived to have the strongest technology offerings. Sangram Kadam, Head-Sales, India & SAARC, SYSTIME Computer Systems, the first partner for IBM Cognos in India, says the IBM brand has helped the company in pushing BI to its customers. “The vendor is very keen on coming up with product updates and adding new products. We would rate them highly on the support and service aspect as well. They have the right solutions, strategies, and also the coverage which makes them the leaders in this market.”
Surprisingly, SAS, which is a leader in the BI market, was not rated quite highly by the partners with poor ratings in training & certification and financial terms costing the company a higher overall rating.
Financial terms seemed to be a weak point of almost all the vendors and partners have given a low rating for this in comparison to the other five parameters.
— Radhika Nallayam
Client Security Software
Client Security Software
Symantec
Symantec is a good vendor to work with. It is an aggressive principal which spends good money on training and certification. They have a well drawn up calendar for partners to plan and gain knowledge from these training sessions. anuj gupta, director,- sales, MIEl e-Security Symantec emerged on top in this category, though by a relatively small margin. Though the vendor came out on top in only one out of the six parameters i.e. in customer support – the fact that it did consistently well in the rest of the parameters helped it to move to the top.
Though competitors like Websense, Quick Heal, and Check Point were perceived to be better in some of the parameters, they were some distance away from Symantec when it came to customer support. With an extensive partner base, Symantec has ensured that partners acknowledge its efficient, quick, and dedicated customer support.
Symantec managed to score well in introducing technology solutions to Indian partners, though it lost the top spot in that parameter to Check Point by a small margin. In yet another crucial element of go- to- market strategy, which revolves around management styles or simply put vendor–channel relationships, Symantec again lost to Check Point. Similarly, in the training & certification parameter, it was marginally outdone, in this case by Websense.
MIEL e-Security is a Symantec platinum partner. Anuj Gupta, Director –Sales, MIEL affirms, “Over the years we have realized that Symantec is a good vendor to work with. It is an aggressive principal which spends good money on training and certification. They also have a well drawn calendar for partners to plan, attend, and gain knowledge from these training sessions.”
There was a hair line difference between the silver and bronze winners. While Websense was rated as the best in the training & certifications parameter, Check Point came out on top in the technology solutions and management styles parameters, which helped the vendor catapult over Websense for the silver. The achilles heel for Check Point turned out to be marketing assistance and financial terms parameters, while for Websense it was customer support, which cost the vendor a higher ranking.
Bangalore based Kinfotech worked with Surf Control for four years before the latter was acquired by Websense a year ago. As a Websense partner, the solution provider is content with the channel oriented reputation of the vendor backed by marketing and customer activities. “It is way ahead in technologies like DLP than its competitors. They have always invested in resources for partners,” says Ashok Prabhu, VP, Kinfotech.
An Indian MNC, Quick Heal was appreciated for its focused and aggressive marketing activities for its partners. Quick Heal also was a bit ahead of MNCs like McAfee demonstrating the importance of the close to customer factor for partners.
Trend Micro, with a substantial market share across enterprise and SMBs did not feature in top five.
At an overall level, training and certification, marketing assistance, and financial terms, were the parameters in which almost all vendors fared relatively poorly. On the other hand, almost all vendors were rated comparatively higher in the technology solutions parameter. Perhaps there is an underlying message for security vendors.
— Yogesh Gupta
Desktops & Notebooks
Desktops & Notebooks
Hewlett Packard
Contradictory to popular belief, the overall India PC market grew 5.2 percent during the April-June quarter to touch 1.76 million shipments over the previous quarter. For the same period desktop PC shipments have risen 4.4 percent, while notebook PC shipments grew 7.2 percent. This set the precedent for the global PC shipments which grew 2.3 percent in the third quarter compared to the same quarter a year earlier, to 78.1 million units. Even Gartner which had expected PC shipments to decline 5.6 percent in the third quarter confirmed the growth trend.
Riding on this wave is HP, which has retained its top spot in India in the overall PC (Notebooks and Desktops combined) market with a market share of 17.8 percent. Not to be distracted by lofty numbers, HP has retained it relationship with its channel partners. Seemingly, that’s why its partners rate it above others in this category.
Validating the popularity of the vendor, Sachin Rao, CEO, Dream Quest Infotech, says, “We have been associated with HP for almost nine years and such a long relationship is a testimony to the fact that it is a good vendor to work with. But, as in any sustained involvement, ours too is a love-hate relation. We are an authorized service centre for HP PCs and while technologically its products are far superior to its competitors, it sometimes becomes a challenge to match the best of technology with the best of prices.” He admits that partners have to put in more efforts in convincing customers to pay a premium for the HP brand, but the vendor is extremely supportive in partner efforts at educating customers.
Dell was close on the heels of HP in almost all parameters and even outperformed it in terms of customer support but was rated rather poorly in terms of the training and certifications that it provided to its customers and partners. “Technical support is excellent and the ready availability of technical documents that they provide is highly useful when one is dealing with clients like the government. Dell undoubtedly delivers n+1 technology (considering ‘n’ to be the current technology delivered by competition) and is clearly ahead on that front,” points out Yogesh Godbole, Director, Acebrain Systems.
According to IDC, Lenovo failed to grasp the hot netbook market and like other large vendors, was several months late to the netbook party. Unlike HP or Dell, Lenovo hasn’t been able to catch up, despite introducing critically praised, technically advanced models that were the envy of competitors, such as the Nvidia Ion-powered netbook.
Interestingly, Acer, which overtook Dell as the world’s second-largest computer vendor during the third quarter of 2009, was rated below it and was just on par with the average in terms of the satisfaction of its channel partners.
Zenith and Toshiba did not meet partner expectation in any of the segments while a lack of a strong customer support mechanism is the key pain area for HCL. Sony was rated the highest in terms of its technology solutions and fell short of the mark in segments like customer support, pricing flexibility, and training & certification programs.
—Anup Varier
Enterprise Networking - Hardware
Enterprise Networking - Hardware
Cisco
Cisco demonstrated its domination as a networking leader garnering top scores in five out of six parameters. It only faltered in the financial terms parameter, a tad behind Extreme Networks and HP ProCurve. D-Link, which was placed fifth on the table, gained the highest points in this category.Its aggressive branding and marketing activities across the Indian market, were supported by partners as well. Cisco’s first Tier II partner in India since 1998 and a premium select partner of the firm, Kaybee Infotech, vouches for the vendor’s training programs. Ketan Barai, MD, Kaybee Infotech, is content with the principals training and certifications programs on its innovative technology solutions. “Our technical staff and engineers are abreast with such initiatives to recommend the right solution to our customers. Their management hierarchy with different people across verticals which co-ordinates with our sales team helps us close deals faster,” he says.
Extreme Networks managed to take second place, marginally higher than third placed Juniper. Extreme Networks was rated higher than Juniper across marketing assistance, customer support, financial terms and management styles. Delhi-based INTEC Infotech has been working with Extreme Networks since a year after their eight year alliance with Nortel. “We wanted to align with a brand which is dependable and offers a number of opportunities. Extreme is a well accepted brand with its wide product solutions,” says Rajeev Goel, Director, INTEC Infotech.
The relatively lesser branding activities by Juniper amongst channel and customers across India for the last few years was rightly reflected. A better score in this department would have helped Juniper edge ahead of the Silver winner. Magic Systems located at Ahmedabad has been a Juniper partner for the past four years. “Since the last eighteen months, Juniper has been more focused on partner development and enablement through trainings. There has been an increase in their training sessions for our staff and Webex is also more regular,” informs Gautam Verma, Director, Magic Systems. Brand acceptance and technology innovations amongst customers against major vendors has never been an issue with Juniper, he adds. However, their renewed focus will facilitate the Juniper –customer relationship through partners.
The fifth placed D-Link was recognized as a networking vendor which executes effective marketing assistance and financial terms. But the vendor lost out on its low score of technology innovations. Surprisingly, HP ProCurve, which is otherwise recognized as a leader in the networking market, failed to make it to the top five and was placed marginally behind D-Link. The networking arm of HP could not garner partner support when it came to the crucial yardstick of customer support, marketing assistance, and training & certification.
With the overall Ethernet switch market revenue growth coming from datacenters, networking vendors are pursuing their datacentre centric solutions through partners. As vendors get aggressive to capture a slice of this market, expect fireworks, especially from the leaders.
— Yogesh Gupta
Network Security Appliances
Network Security Appliances
Cyberoam
One of the fastest growing markets in the world with more than 14 percent CAGR, network security appliances are a dynamic industry in India as well. The Indian market for network security, in fact, is said to have a higher growth rate. As one of the few areas that was affected by the downturn, this market accelerated significantly due to increased adoption in sectors like BFSI, telecom and government. As a result, the market naturally witnesses stiff competition with leading players regularly coming up with new strategies and products.
Cyberoam, in the eyes of the partners, was just a shade ahead of Juniper and Cisco in this category, though its technology solutions were perceived to be weaker than that of its competitors. The various deciding factors for Cyberoam were its marketing assistance, training & certification, customer support, and management styles.
Amit Rastogi, Director, Computer Valley, is one of the key partners of Cyberoam. He agrees that the vendor is known for its service and technical support. “We have been working with Cyberoam for the last three years and it has been a good experience. It’s an easy company to work with and the team at Cyberoam puts in extra efforts to communicate information to customers as well as partners. They have ensured support to us during critical situations. On the whole, they are good in terms of faster response and the willingness to listen. This in turn helps us in giving timely responses to our customers,” says Rastogi.
In this category, the close competition between Cyberoam and Juniper in almost all the six parameters was interesting. In fact, in technology solutions, Juniper scored much better than Cyberoam.
Manish Gupta, Network Security Product Manager of MM9 Information Technologies says, “I would rate Juniper high for their after-sales support and stability of product lines. Customers are happy about the quality of products they offer and we get fewer complaints on it from our customers.”
Cisco was rated consistently high by its partners across all parameters. Uttam Majumdar, Founder of Locuz Enterprise Solutions, says, “I would give a good rating to Cisco across all parameters. I believe great people make a great company and Cisco is the best example for that. They follow the global work standards and have maintained a very good relationship with us as a partner. Cisco is great to work with and is unmatched in the way they position their products.”
Interestingly, the participants of the survey rated Fortinet above others when it came to technology. But Fortinet was pushed down to the fifth position as it was not rated as well in parameters like certifications and financial terms.
Three vendors - SonicWall, McAfee, Trend Micro - were rated below average for their technology solutions, marketing assistance, training and certification and for their management styles. As a result, these three companies, otherwise known as the leaders in this market, did not make it to the top five.
— Radhika Nallayam
Network Security Software
Network Security Software
Symantec
Despite a slower growth rate, the results show that the security market did not suffer a significant impact from the economic downturn. Gartner has analyzed that the worldwide security software market will total $14.5 billion in 2009, an 8 percent increase from 2008 and it anticipates the market to grow 13 percent in 2010 as revenue will total $16.3 billion. The enterprise security software market in particular, is formed by a number of segments such as endpoint protection platform, email security boundary, and user provisioning.
The key drivers that fuel the growth of the IT security software spending include the increasing demand for data security and privacy, along with the need to protect IT infrastructure from the ever escalating rise in sophisticated and targeted attacks.
Symantec continued to be the market leader, accounting for 22 percent of security software revenue in Asia Pacific in 2008, letting go of just 0.8 per cent of the market from the previous year. The company, it seems, has continued its good run with unrelenting support from the channel partners who have gone ahead and rated it as the top vendor in this category.
“Apart from a highly robust product portfolio, Symantec is very stable both in terms of the software it provides and in terms of its manpower, which unlike other vendors is an experienced team and has been with the company for a long time. This especially helps in a vendor’s relationships with its channel partners,” emphasizes Irvinder Singh, Director, CI Infotech.
Flexibility in the pricing strategy and its dominance in the technology sphere have helped Symantec in garnering support from its partners. “Symantec products are competitively priced and they are also open to special price requests made by the partners to fulfill the needs of key customers. It understands the pulse of the market and acts accordingly,” adds Singh.
McAfee was a too-close-for-comfort second and walked home with best results in the customer support category. Infact, McAfee experienced the strongest growth rate among the top five vendors, as its revenue increased 30.1 percent in 2008. Vipul Dutta, CEO, FutureSoft Solutions, is not surprised and exclaims, “This is a result of company’s sustained effort and investment to uplift the partner skills and customer delight. McAfee in India has evolved in the recent past and this has helped the company achieve highest levels of partner and customer satisfaction.”
The surprise entry however, was Websense which according to partner opinion gives industry heavyweights like the Big Blue a run for its money. “When it comes to a comprehensive security cover over, not even the established brands can compete with Websense. This becomes absolutely essential when dealing with an environment that cannot compromise on security or productivity. With Websense’s solutions, time wastage on individual activity monitoring can be avoided. This combined with the readily-available support is what makes Websense a favored vendor,” says VM Muralidharan, Director, Precision Techserve.
IBM and Check Point were neck to neck in most of the parameters except management styles where IBM’s score floored that of its rival.
— Anup Varier
Network Storage
Network Storage
EMC
Storage in basic terms means keeping data files and programs in a centralized file server or storage system. Up until last year it was the top priority of enterprises. Then came the slowdown and the global external controller-based disk storage market declined 15.7 percent in Q2 09, according to Gartner. The buoyancy of partners though doesn’t seem to be affected by the downturn in vendors’ fortunes. Marketing assistance, customer support and training have helped partners pin hopes on their vendors to see them through the tough times.
However, all is not topsy turvy in the storage market; there seem to be a few bright spots such as Network Attached Storage (NAS), which has managed a growth of almost 4 percent. The total disk storage systems capacity shipped also reached 2,146 petabytes, growing 14.8 percent, according to IDC.
In such a volatile market, EMC, NetApp, and Sun have managed to come out on top, as rated by the partners. While all three vendors come in the top seven in the worldwide storage market, the fact that biggies such as IBM and HP haven’t been able to break into the top three is hard to ignore. HP didn’t even make it to the top five and received low ratings, especially in the financial terms parameter. Another storage vendor, Netgear also hasn’t made the cut as far as partners are concerned and has scored miserably on the training & certification parameter, less than half of their nearest competitor, HP, in this parameter.
Leon Computers has been an EMC partner for the past two years and bears testimony to EMC’s assistance in marketing. Rahul Meher, MD, Leon Computers, says, “EMC passes on their account leads to us and we receive support from their side while pitching solutions to customers. They even send a team with us for client interactions. Their marketing and channel related activities are unmatched when compared to other vendors.”
However, as far as customer support, technology solutions, and management styles are concerned NetApp rules the roost. SBA Info Solutions tells us why. “NetApp stands apart in the storage vendor crowd because of their unified storage solution and diversified product range. The vendor ensures that it concentrates on its core strengths along with making its support pack title clear at the time of purchase of equipment. NetApp also ensures good customer support for us,” says V Anantha Narayanan, MD, SBA.
Vendor partner relationships can improve rapidly if partners are provided the right certifications along with business on good financial terms is the general perception. Shell Networks is planning on engaging with Sun at a higher level next year. “Sun limits itself to specific partners who have to qualify an internal evaluation. I think this is what makes an organization feel lucky to be one of the exclusive partners that Sun deals with. The vendor also takes a proactive approach when it comes to training their partners and customers,” says AL Srinath, Director, Shell Networks.
The latest technology and marketing assistance can work wonders while gaining new ground. This is what partners need the most from their principals.
—Sneha Kupekar
Servers
Servers
IBM
In the past couple of years, the server landscape has transformed into a commodity business with high volume demand across enterprises and SMBs. This has put more pressure on channels to show the value proposition of server offerings to their customers. As a result, most vendors are engaged in introducing innovative products backed by efficient software solutions and robust technology roadmap. The top three vendors- IBM, Sun and HP – are emphasizing a lot on solution-based selling for partners rather than merely pushing boxes.
According to Gartner, in revenue terms, IBM maintained its first position by controlling 39 percent of the market in Q2 of 09. Likewise, solution providers seem to be content aligning with IBM for server business. The Big Blue was rated ahead of its rivals Sun and HP in three important parameters – Technology Solutions, Marketing Assistance and Customer Support. The thin margin between first two places further highlights the tough fight between the industry leading vendors.
An IBM partner since last 8 years, Mumbai based Network Techlab aggressively pushes this brand than other server brands in its portfolio. “It’s the good brand acceptance within our customer segment that we end up selling more IBM servers. The financial terms through distributors are fine and IBM supports us well in terms of marketing activities, which helps us propel their technologically advanced servers,” says Atul Gosar, Director, Network Techlab.
Sun’s score highlighted the importance of hand holding channels, especially in terms of training & certification. Saurin Shah, MD, Ashtech Infotech, says, “Sun has been impeccable with their training & certification schedules and they are a nice company to work with when it comes to financial terms.” Another advantage of working with Sun, according to Shah, is that their partner base is less compared to other vendors, thus helping reduce competition amongst partners.
HP retained the leading position in server shipments in Q2 of 09 with a 29 percent share, with majority of them being in the x86 platforms, according to Gartner. Surprisingly, HP did not top in any of the six parameters.
Diwakar Khatri, COO, Micro Clinic India, feels, “Channel relationship management has always been a forte for HP.” A premium partner for HP servers, Kharti rates HP’s marketing assistance and customer support far better than that of others. “Technology wise, most server vendors are at par. The game lies in building a trustworthy bridge between the channels and the customers and HP is the best in that respect,” he asserts.
Fujitsu’s technology innovations were appreciated by partners but the vendor needs to rapidly improvise on its channel training programs and the customer support experience to help partners.
With the downward trend in server shipments across Asia Pacific continuing, with a 17.2 percent year on year decline in the second quarter of 09, the server vendors need to put in extra efforts to empower their channels to drive more sales across India.
— Yogesh Gupta
Storage Management Software
Storage Management Software
Symantec
Symantec and EMC dominated three of the categories each and their scores established their leadership. But Symantec just managed to nudge past the latter by a fine margin in the overall score to be crowned the ‘Most Valued Principal’ in the realm of storage management software. This result is a reversal of roles in terms of the market share enjoyed by the two companies. According to IDC estimates, EMC led the overall market with 22.4 percent revenue share in Q2 09 followed by Symantec with a share of 18.5 percent.
However, the partner rating shows that Symantec keeps them happy in terms of product features and technical performance and gives them no reason to complain in the pre-sales and market development activities. Symantec is recognized for its pricing flexibility and margins. Echoing the same sentiments, Prasanna Shroff, Vice President – Business Development, Apara Enterprise says, “Their sales enablement program is comprehensive with good coverage on both technology and business management aspects. Symantec’s pricing strategy is value-based and flexible to suit domestic customers’ needs. The margins offered by Symantec and their special quarterly rebate schemes have been a motivational factor for SI partners.”
A strong performance in post-sales support coupled with comprehensive certification programs keep EMC on the top. The vendor is also popular with its partners for its high interaction levels and conflict resolution skills. “We have been working with EMC for six years now. It has a comprehensive portfolio that caters to customers needs in an end-to-end spectrum,” informs Neeraj Mediratta, Director, Ace Data Devices.
NetApp was not one to be left behind and its partner sentiment reveals that it fares well in almost all categories but falls short in terms of customer support. It is also the only major vendor that has experienced a positive revenue growth (0.8 percent) in a market when the worldwide storage software market experienced another decline in YoY growth in the second quarter of 09 with revenues of $2.8 billion. Sudarsan Ranganathan, Founder and CEO, Veeras Infotek affirms, “It has been a pleasant experience partnering with NetApp, as they have an integrated approach and a solution-based focus. They also have a very structured certification program and show deep commitment in this regard. We missed out on one of its programs due to certain visa issues but they made alternative arrangements for us to undergo that training in Greece.”
The vendors figuring third and fourth on the overall revenue share list also exchanged places in the partner rating list. IBM might be ahead of NetApp in terms of its share in the storage software market but fails to meet expectations where partner satisfaction is concerned. Likewise, HP and CA could not pull off an impressive show as they were marked below par by the partners in not one but all the categories in which the survey was conducted. A lack of proper customer support looks like the key pain area that needs to be addressed if vendors expect to appease their partners.
— Anup Varier
Systems & Network Management Software
Systems & Network Management Software
CA
CA dominated this category as a clear winner. Rated high on technology solutions, the software vendor was perceived to be better than its competitors in customer support, financial terms, and management styles. The vendor did lag behind in marketing assistance and training & certification, but only behind Microsoft, which finished at second place on overall ratings.
CA scored a relatively high score for its management styles in term of effective hand holding of channel partners. A gold partner of CA, F1 Infotek, headquartered in Delhi, describes a successful vendor – channel alliance since past seven years. Sunil Gupta, Director, F1 Infotek, says, “CA experience has always been good with respect to latest software offerings and technical support to our team. The acceptability of product across both our customer segments – Enterprise and SMB – is also beneficial to us.” CA’s Spectrum Infrastructure Manager is a well accepted solution for enterprises concerned about mission critical applications and other related IT components, according to Gupta. The customer support is excellent at both the first and second levels, he points out.
Software giant Microsoft has appealed to partners with its offerings beyond just an operating system. It came in second, ahead of rivals like HP and IBM. Partnering with Microsoft for over three years, Magnamious Systems is successfully pursuing the vendor’s offerings like System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) and Systems Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) to its customers. Jiten Mehta, Director, Magnamious Systems, says, “Microsoft is very clear and always aggressive about their product roadmap. Their high level support, training and certification sessions, and extensive learning materials are good for our technical team.” Once you are aligned with Microsoft, all channel related issues are well-oiled to ensure a smooth and successful relationship, says Mehta.
HP scored high on technology solutions. However, the vendor needs to be more focused on customer support and marketing assistance, as per the partner feedback. HP’s desktop management software OpenView has been a well accepted product in the industry, says Rajeev Mehta, CEO, Zest Systems. A long time HP partner, Mehta says, “Technology roadmap and education of partners has always been a forte of HP. With technology converging on a common platform, HP’s wide umbrella of varied product portfolio gives it an advantage.”
IBM had a similar fate as HP, scoring at par with CA for its technology solutions. However, low ratings on other parameters meant that it didn’t make it to the top three. Novell was rated highly by partners in terms of financial criterion, but the vendor was not rated highly in any other parameter.
With networks getting complex and extensive, partners expect the relevant software to be in sync with latest innovations in hardware field. Partners at large, prefer vendors with robust technology roadmap backed by customer support and marketing assistance. The battle of multi product vendors like Microsoft, HP, and IBM to make their mark and gain confidence of channel folks against software giant CA should be interesting in the future.
— Yogesh Gupta
Wireless Networking
Wireless Networking
Cisco
The market for enterprise networking equipment in India is estimated to grow to $1.7 billion by 2012, recording a CAGR of 15 percent, says a recent study done by Springboard Research. Market analysts predict that 2009 has seen the growth coming from industry verticals like BFSI, telecom and government. Wireless networking constitutes a key part of this market and all the networking players are quite active in this space. Most of the vendors have now diversified their products lines to cover wireless technologies as well.
Cisco, the all time leader in networking, emerged the winner in wireless networking category with a clear margin over its competitors. In fact, it was rated to be the best in most of the parameters. The company’s strengths, according to partners, are its technology and marketing assistance. However, Cisco’s partners do not seem to be too happy with the vendor’s financial terms, perhaps a result of its dominant position in the market. Central Data Systems Private Limited has been working with Cisco right from the time of its inception. Subrahmanya K, Director of the company, says, “We are very passionate about working with Cisco and it has been an exciting journey for us. I would say Cisco is one of the very few companies that can be called as a ‘true channel company’. They never go to customers directly. Besides, they ensure that we get the highest margins and they never interfere in pricing. Every project is driven entirely by the partner, right from the beginning. They help us to get into new markets and their go-to-market strategies are unparalleled.”
The silver winner, HP Procurve, was rated consistently well in most of the parameters though its weak point turned out to be marketing assistance and management styles. Contrary to Cisco, HP ProCurve’s financial terms seem to be more satisfactory to its partners.
Ravinder Burju, Director, Texcel Infotech, says, “We are quite happy about HP ProCurve’s second generation of products as these allow for seamless integration and have fewer complaints. Most importantly, HP ProCurve is one of the very few vendors who have made their product portfolio open to all types of partners. So, you don’t really have to be a networking partner to associate with ProCurve. Besides, a partner who sells any other product line of ProCurve can also start offering their networking products. So there is hardly any demarcation among the partners. Last, but not least, their warranty and replacement policies are extremely good. Overall, it has been a great experience working with HP ProCurve.”
The bronze winner, D-Link was rated consistently across the parameters. Anantharam VV, Director of Webcom Information Technology, says, “D-link has a comprehensive range of products and they also focus on giving good pricing to us. They have good partner schemes that have helped us in many ways. Most importantly, they do a lot of joint marketing activities to help us get more deals. They are in constant touch with us and provide us with efficient support.”
SMC Networks, the networking brand of Accton, wwhich did not make it to the top five, was rated poorly across parameters.
— Radhika Nallayam
Workgroup Printers & MFDs
Workgroup Printers & MFDs
Canon
The combined printer, copier and multi-functional device (MFD) market in India totalled nearly 0.6 million units in Q3 09, a 15.7 per cent decline over Q3 08, reflecting a global trend, according to Gartner. With the exception of Canon and Epson; three of the top-five vendors recorded a decline in sales in the same quarter. The quarter was notable because it was the first time Canon replaced HP from its top position in the Indian page printer market, increasing its market share to 38.7 percent compared to HP’s 36.2 percent. Increased focus on smaller cities and adding more partners has helped Canon attain this growth, according to Gartner analysts.
Canon hasn’t come out on top only with regards to market share but has also emerged the clear winner in channel relationships, followed by HP and a surprise entry, Xerox. The rating given by the partners has thrown up interesting results with Samsung and Epson, who feature in the top five in market share, having not been rated highly. Lexmark, however, hasn’t been able to break into the elusive five having been rated quite poorly across all parameters especially in training & certification which is three times lesser than their nearest competitor, Epson.
This, however, seems to be Canon’s year. Its efforts at providing top-notch customer support and training have helped its partners to slowly and steadily eat into HP’s market share. “Canon’s interaction levels with partners are quite high and their portal where we can discuss our problems is very helpful. I think their strong points are their two-year warranty on products and the fact that partners can directly do business with them, whereas with other vendors we often have to go through a distributor,” said Sanjeev Gupta, Director, Veltronics India.
While Canon has managed to upset HP’s top position, HP still remains the leader in providing marketing assistance and top-of-the-line technology solutions, feel partners. Zest System’s CEO, Rajeev Mehta is one of HP’s oldest partners and has been associated with them since their inception in India. “HP has the right technological inclination and their products are built according to customer requirement. They have about seven categories of MFD’s so they can cater to any segment and their marketing and customer related support is as good as their technology. HP’s pricing flexibility and good margins combined with the best technologies at a competitive price, makes it a win-win situation for us,” said Mehta.
Xerox might not figure in the top five printer vendors in India on the basis of market share, but has been rated highly by its partners, especially on its financial terms and management style. Rajan Sood, Director, ABE ValuePoint Systems, has been a Xerox partner for the last 15 years. “Our partnership with Xerox has been excellent, especially in profitability terms. Their management style and marketing assistance has been useful and it provides cutting edge technology. Xerox’s pro-active approach and the fact that their certifications are available online make it easier for us to stay up-to-date. I think Xerox’s strongest point is their support to ealers, which sets them apart,” said Sood.
— Sneha Kupekar
Winners At A Glance
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