EMC (NYSE:EMC) has revealed more details about its Federation Ready partner programme, which went live in July.
The vendor says it has established the programme to make it easier for its channel partners to build solutions that combine offerings from itself and members of EMC’s federation of companies: VMware, RSA, Pivotal and VCE.
“Both our customers and our partners wanted a way to deal with the Federation with less friction,” says EMC’s global channel chief, Gregg Ambulos.
Partners will attain ‘Federation Ready’ status when they complete the appropriate sales and technical certifications in Federation technologies.
“It’s a big investment for partners to be Federation Ready; not every partner is able do it. You need to have a lot of certifications across all the Federated companies,” says Ambulos, who was speaking with press at the Canalys Channels Forum in Barcelona.
These partners will earn addition incentives within all Federated channel programmes.
Ambulos says EMC is also going to appoint a Federation lead to be a common face for partners. They will oversee all activities including driving business and go-to-market plans.
The vendor is also introducing a registration desk “to remove friction and conflict” when registering sales opportunities.
Lastly, says the exec, EMC is also establishing rules of engagement to protect partner activities within the opportunity.
The new programme “masks that complexity” around the Federation, according to EMC’s VP of global partner marketing, Fred Kohout: “The Federation is a complicated business model; it’s not easy to provide unique value around Big Data, cloud, mobility…Gregg’s taking a complex business model that enables partners to deliver distinct value,” he says.
There are currently 15 partners globally working way their through the programme. Ambulos says he expects them to become fully fledged Federation Ready partners by the end of the year.
Dell has confirmed its intention to acquire EMC in a $67bn takeover, the biggest ever in the tech sector, taking the storage giant private while virtualisation specialist VMware remains a publicly-traded company.
