IBM Unveils One Channel Team to Propel Business Partner of the Future

LAS VEGAS, Feb. 10, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- At the PartnerWorld Leadership Conference, IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced the One Channel Team, designed to bring simplicity to the channel by helping Business Partners build skills, drive demand and increase growth as they transform for the future.

"As IBM continues its move to higher value solutions in strategic markets, we are helping Business Partners solve business challenges for clients by providing them deeper skills, collaborative tools and new growth opportunities," said Marc Dupaquier, General Manager, IBM Global Business Partners. "With the One Channel Team, we've built a strong, dynamic partner ecosystem that is designed to make it easier for Business Partners to build more profitable lines of business. Business Partners who have already transformed with us are seeing the results."

The One Channel Team aligns channel operations from across the company to provide broader, more competitive partner experience, as current and future IBM Business Partners capitalize on new market trends based on cloud, analytics, mobile, social and security. The move also increases IBM's focus on recruitment of new Business Partners, developers and Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) delivering solutions aligned to IBM strategic initiatives.

"The channel continues to evolve as more partners are focusing on business solutions rather than product transactions, selling to the line of business more often than in the past and developing more of their own intellectual property," said Darren Bibby, Program Vice President of Channels and Alliances Research, IDC. "The greater cloud market alone is expected to reach $118 billion this year, representing a huge opportunity for partners who embrace it. In fact, IDC estimates that Business Partners expect to almost double their cloud-oriented business in the next two years." 

IBM is accelerating the pace for current and future IBM Business Partners to transform and capitalize on these new market opportunities based on the IBM Cloud Marketplace, SoftLayer, Bluemix, and the ability to build scalable applications with the Watson Ecosystem and customize solutions with IBM Systems. In addition, the social collaboration solution, IBM Verse, due in March, provides Business Partners the opportunity for an improved mail and social experience while developing recurring annuity models, and offers valuable services, such as messaging migration and support.

To help Business Partners grow and succeed, IBM is:

Driving transformation by deepening skills with enhanced education initiatives

• Expanding IBM's Business Transformation Initiative (BTI) with over 300 new workshops aimed at helping qualifying Business Partners through a strategic consulting engagement which can help improve profitability and performance in growth areas as well as accelerate their transformation;

• Developing deeper knowledge and partner skills with a more intuitive platform for resources, including new educational modules around industry shifts, along with a broader roadmap of courses that lead to certifications, through the enhanced  PartnerWorld University platform;

• Delivering greater educational incentives through an improved Know Your IBM learning portal now with triple the earning potential to reward for individual sales and technical staff when elevating skills around IBM's infrastructure portfolio, as well as strategic growth areas, such as cloud and analytics. 

Delivering marketing and developer tools to help partners drive demand and innovation

• Increasing digital and social campaigns with co-marketing funds to provide Business Partners more web-based marketing and social media content, across the range of IBM products and solutions, with the enhancement of the IBM Digital Content Marketing platform;

• Increasing technical assets to help Business Partners and developers build and port customized server and storage solutions with OpenPOWER Developer Tools, maintained by the OpenPOWER Foundation's more than 90 members. These assets enable the development of new solutions with IBM's open, licensable and high-performance POWER architecture.

Broadening partner ecosystems to drive growth

• Enhancing IBM's dedicated developer engagement community with dW Answers, where IBM subject matter experts and external peers provide support, share expertise and build their network. Members can experience new topic and solution-specific Developer Centers – dedicated places for IBM development communities to quickly, directly, and authentically engage;

• Increasing opportunities for growth with cognitive computing and the opportunity to resell Watson Explorer, a powerful combination of data exploration and content analytics capabilities, providing the bridge between cloud-based services and on premise proprietary information. By offering Watson Explorer, Business Partners can help their clients reduce unnecessary research time, and work faster.

Delivering new incentives to make it easier to grow profitably with IBM

• Increasing compensation through the Partner Growth Incentive (PGI) for selling IBM Power Systems and IBM Storage. The new program offers a quarterly incentive that doubles if certain requirements are met, and a quarterly bonus for achieving specific skills and certifications;

• Simplifying certification requirements for selected Software as a Service (SaaS) offerings enabling Business Partners to earn incentives faster, with the new IBM SaaS Entry Product Group;

• Improving rewards with the new Remarketer Margin Enhancer, which offers a 10 percent margin enhancement on incremental revenue for achieving revenue growth targets when reselling IBM Services; and a new Services Consumption Program to help Business Partners drive demand for service provider solutions;

• Expanding eligibility for the Solution Accelerator Incentive that allows a Business Partners to earn an additional bonus on IBM defined solutions with the SAI Solution Bonus Reward.

For more information about the Beacon Awards, Choice Awards and Beacon Laureate Award, visit www.ibm.com/partnerworld/beacons.

For more details, please visit the IBM PartnerWorld Leadership Conference 2015 online media kit or follow # #IBMPWLC on Twitter. 

For information about the IBM PartnerWorld program and portal, visit here.

For more information about IBM's zero percent financing¹ and Rapid Financing™ app, ² visit IBM Global Financing.

¹ IBM Global Financing offerings are provided through IBM Credit LLC in the United States and other IBM subsidiaries and divisions worldwide to qualified commercial and government clients.

 ² The IBM Rapid Financing™ app is available in over 30 countries worldwide via Google Play™ and the App Store.

Media Contact

Dayna Fried
IBM Media Relations
925-493-9020
[email protected]

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