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Delivering High Returns to Partners

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Nivedan Prakash
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F5 Networks, one of the global leaders in Application Delivery Networking (ADN), seems to be very much focused on the Indian market. It is evident from the fact that in the last 1 year, the company has invested heavily on people and market outreach. Besi­des, it has also increased its presence in many more verticals compared to what it used to focus before.

"When we started off, we were primarily in telecom and enterprise verticals but now we are also into government, BFSI, and IT/ITeS sectors. Today, we have solutions catering to all these verticals. Our focus has definitely paid us off in the last 1 year," said Anil Pochiraju, MD, India and Saarc, F5 Networks.

Pochiraju added, "It is good to see a grow­ing organization and today, people in the market know and talk about F5 Networks. Previously, we were known as a load balancer company but once we started interacting and educating our customers more aggressively, we witnessed much more acceptance. The fact that we have been able to convert the market from load balancers to application delivery has been a huge win."

From the positioning perspective, the com­pany relies on its strength of making applica­tions work better and address the business needs of its customers. It has taken the same approach here in India as well. Right now, the company's sales team in India is headed by Pochiraju who is responsible for overseeing the company's efforts in the country with a focus on driving the strategic growth and operational performance across the region and developing strong partnerships. With his efforts, F5 has been able to create a strong foothold in the Indian market.

Meanwhile, the company is soon going to appoint a dedicated national channel manager, who will be responsible for looking after the company's entire channel operations in the country. It will then appoint regional channel managers who will be responsible to manage their respective regions. These regional channel managers will also be responsible for driving sales and engaging partners in their respective regions.

And while writing its growth story, F5 selects those channel part­ners who could address the market demand and help the custo­mers by providing the best technological solutions. The company also wants to ensure that the partners understand applications, networks, and security, as it encompasses all these facets in its solutions.

Moreover, the company wants its partners to be successful and contribute to its success. As per a well-planned and well-thought stra­tegy, F5 evaluates and signs its partners. The company understands their strengths and niche areas and then come up with a business plan in terms of how they will go to the market. In this endeavor, it also provides them both sales and technical certifications and accreditation so that they understand each and every aspect of the business on the fly. Besides, it also helps them with the demo boxes and POS.

"Nowhere in the world we go directly to the market. We have always believed that channel part­ners are key to our success. We have programs and lot of investments that go into the channels. Today, we have around 19 partners in India like IBM, HP, Dell, Dimension Data, Accenture (these are our global SI part­ners). Then we have local SI partners like Wipro and TCS and tier-2 SI partners like Cubix. We are looking to grow these partnerships," pointed out Pochiraju.

F5 also has a very strong value added distri­bution channel wherein it is working with 3 distributors-Avnet, Westcon, and Transition in India. While Avnet and Westcon are its global distri­butors, Transition is the distributor for APAC region.

Pochiraju stated, "Apart from box pushers, they are also certified and accredited distri­butors. They also run programs for our partners. If a partner wants to conduct a seminar or a roadshow and if he is looking at resources for organizing it, then these distributors help them along with our marketing team. Apart from adding value, they work very closely with our entire team to ensure that our GTM strategy and messaging are all consistent."

The company has recently launched F5 UNITY Partner Program in Asia Pacific region including the Indian market. Building on the previous success of program components in North America, Europe, Middle East, and Africa, this UNITY Partner Program creates an open­ness in the F5 value added partner community by establishing clear success criteria to reward partner investment, and ultimately to facilitate an outstanding customer experience. The company beli­eves that this program will extend assistance to its resellers and distributors to add more value for its customers while ensu­­ring growth, profitability, and return on investment.

Some of the main advantages of the UNITY Partner Program as as follows:

l UNIFIED DEAL REGISTRATION: This ena­bles part­­ners to better identify and pursue opportunities, leading to smoother sales cycles and enhanced returns

l INVESTMENT SUPPORT: It features discounts based on partners providing clearly defined value-added services, including training pro­grams that increase their customers' awareness and knowledge of application delivery solu­tions. F5 sales and technical accreditation pro­grams are designed to establish a consistent and powerful learning methodology for F5's growing network of partners worldwide, and are available to F5 partners at no cost.

l COMPREHENSIVE PARTNER PORTAL: Tight integration with F5's CRM infrastructure gives partners the ability to intelligently track sales opportunities, and simplifies access to solution information and other F5 resources.

l MARKETING TOOLS DESIGNED FOR DISTRI­BUTORS: F5 arms channel partners with dedi­­­­­­­­­­­cated mar­­­­­keting resources, including pro­­gra­­mmatic sup­­­port for lead generation, custo­mer-focused events, and targeted out­reach campaigns.

Now that the company has laid the ground work in terms of making the brand visible and passed its message to the market in the last 1 year, now it is looking at signing up new partners more aggressively. Besides, it is also looking at creating a broader base and depth in terms of GTM.

"From the last 1 year, our major focus was to ensure that our existing partners are successful. Our messaging was spread out which was also validated by our customers. We have spent time on laying the foundation because once it is done, it becomes a lot more easier for the new partners to understand the whole ecosystem and do business with us. Today, we are seeing a good uptake in terms of partner approaching us and that has brought a sea change," concluded Pochiraju.

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