Subscribe
  • Home
  • /
  • Channel
  • /
  • First Distribution wins Microsoft SPLAR distribution award for SA, WECA

First Distribution wins Microsoft SPLAR distribution award for SA, WECA


Cape Town, 27 Nov 2014

First Distribution's MSP and Hosting team has won the 'Excellence in Execution' award, which was bestowed at the 2014 SPLAR Summit in Istanbul, Turkey in November 2014.

Readiness events, consistent roundtables, licensing expertise, driving business with discipline and integrity, on-time reporting, and adherence to compliance at all times contributed to the success of First Distribution's hosting business, and the winning of the award.

First Distribution's SPLA business has grown significantly over the past year-and-a-half, to the point where it is now the largest SPLA distributor in the MEA region with the greatest number of total partners reporting. The company has invested in technical skills from both a back-office and account management perspective, and coupled with the fact that it has more than 10 years of experience in dealing with SPLA, the distributor's understanding of SPLA and volume licensing is currently of an exceptional standard.

First Distribution's MSP Hosting Programme Manager, Chris Richardson, commented: "First Distribution is very proud to have this award bestowed upon us by Microsoft. Winning this accolade shows the market that we are 100% invested in providing the best level of service and technologies to our partners."

Richardson added: "In the ever-changing IT world where customers are looking for an opex-based model, First Distribution's SPLA offering takes the complexity out of licensing while still giving the service provider and end-customer the flexibility that is needed to fit their business. The SPLA Programme is a fantastic opportunity for service providers to offer customers a single point through which to acquire software services and the associated Microsoft products, so that customers do not need to acquire and deploy their own licensed products. First Distribution has the skills to be able to advise service providers as well as customers, with the best advice in deploying and servicing customers' requirements using Microsoft SPLA."

Microsoft SPLA encompasses every Microsoft product in a pay-per-use model, and includes some of the following benefits:

Pay as you use

Customers pay for what they use and how much they utilise - it is based on simple calculations regarding the number of end-user licences (SAL) or per-processor licences (PL) actually utilised on a monthly basis.

Zero start-up and upgrade cost

Near zero start-up costs as service providers pay for the licences that are used each month. The price quoted for SPLA licences covers the cost of all upgrades and provides customers with the right to use the current as well as the previous versions of the relevant Microsoft products.

Built-in software assurance

Each SPLA licence comes with software assurance granting access to the most current version of Microsoft software products for one monthly price. The option to deploy prior versions still exists.

Facilitation of licensing compliance

By acquiring SPLA, customers meet the compliance requirements for providing hosted services to third parties as per Microsoft.

For any queries regarding Microsoft SPLA and First Distribution, please contact Chris Richardson on (011) 540 2640 or chris@firstdistribution.co.za.

Share

First Distribution

First Distribution is a value-added distributor of leading global brands, providing complex ICT solutions to the enterprise and SME markets, focused on the data centre, virtualisation, hosted applications and cloud-based services, database and middleware, security and network infrastructure, backed up by unparalleled expertise.

For more information, please visit www.firstdistribution.co.za.

Follow us on:

Twitter: twitter.com/FirstDist?
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/first-distribution
Facebook: www.facebook.com/FirstInDistribution

Editorial contacts

Tristan Penver
First Distribution
(+27) 21 529 5555
tristan@firstdistribution.co.za