Storage giant EMC Southern Africa has appointed Nick Christodoulou as channel manager in order to aggressively drive its channel strategy into the local SME sector.
EMC revealed it has made significant changes to its South African channel model by simplifying its partner rebate structure in the form of the EMC Velocity Incentive Programme.
While the storage vendor is dominant in the enterprise market, Christodoulou says the organisation has changed its go-to-market model to target SME customers as well, which he notes will help EMC differentiate from competitors.
“Traditionally, our portfolio has been targeted at the enterprise space, and we are scaling it down to provide offerings to the SME market that suit their business needs and have enterprise-grade quality.”
He indicates: “One of the things we've done is made it financially beneficial for partners to join our channel ecosystem. In terms of the Velocity Incentive Programme, it's a constantly evolving programme and we will continue making advancements, but the most strategic change is in our go-to-market model.”
He adds: “We are looking to have 30 to 40 partners that are strategic and well-aligned to EMC's overall business strategy, and it's important that there's a strong basis for a specific partnership and how we micro-manage those relationships.”
Regarding technologies that have the most impact on the channel, Christodoulou says he believes cloud computing is having an affect. “I think that the customer of the future, especially in the SME space, is not going to acquire traditional infrastructure that we know today.
“I think the entire landscape from a partner perspective is going to change in the next five years, and it will become imperative to have the right partners to build cloud platforms for the SME market.”
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