Monday Morning Impact – November 14

Avaya Refocuses its Channel Strategy

Avaya has rolled out a new channel program with an eye towards helping its network of telecom and IT partners to better adapt to a marketplace more focused on software and services. This new program, dubbed, “Avaya Edge” is based on streamlined requirements, reducing the amount of time partners previously required to complete credentials by up to 50%. In addition, partner co-delivery performance metrics have been reduced 56%.

Partners are now compensated for a broader scope of revenue, including recurring services and software. Also, new incentives will reward partners for strategic areas of achievement, such as customer value, growth and new product adoption.

The new program structure is based on five partner tracks that align with go-to-market models. Revenue targets and rewards based on track and geographic region.

“The strength of a channel program is the degree to which it enables the success of its partners, recognizes and applauds their unique capabilities as they apply them to serve our customers,” said Steve Biondi, vice president and global channel chief at Avaya. “This means the program needs the flexibility within a supportive structure that reduces requirements to only those that are most essential.”

Channel Impact^®
The partner community is highly focused on how to compete in a world in which new models are constantly threatening to displace the legacy ones. Channel programs that acknowledge this reality are often popular with partners.

Rapid7 Announces Consulting and Assessment Services for IoT Security

Rapid7, Inc., a Boston-based provider of security data and analytics, has expanded its consulting and security testing offerings to better support the Internet of Things movement.

“The risk posed by IoT devices has moved from theoretical to real-world,” said Deral Heiland, IoT research lead at Rapid7. “We’re now seeing large-scale attacks that leverage huge numbers of devices against extremely popular organizations. As a result, device developers and manufacturers are coming under increased scrutiny and heightened expectations.”

Rapid7 is particularly focusing on selected verticals, including the transportation, industrial and medical sectors. Services are expected to include threat modeling, testing, device design consulting, and incident response.

Channel Impact^®
The new practice area should be helpful to organizations committed to solid security in the IoT space. Compromised IoT devices have been used in multiple high-profile DDoS attacks.

SentinelOne’s Endpoint Protection Now Available through Avnet

SentinelOne, a Palo Alto-based security company, has announced a strategic partnership with Avnet, Inc., to distribute SentinelOne’s threat detection and prevention technology to its U.S. partners.

Avnet will also take advantage of SentinelOne’s threat protection guarantee, offering financial restitution to its partners and their customers in the unlikely event of a ransomware attack.

“The relationship with Avnet Technology Solutions marks an important milestone in the adoption of next-generation endpoint protection,” said Scott Gainey, SVP and Chief Marketing Officer for SentinelOne. “Avnet is taking a strong leadership stance in the fight against cyber threats by offering dramatic new solutions to its partners, such as bundling SentinelOne for endpoint security with IBM BigFix to deploy the SentinelOne agents.”

Channel Impact^®
Adoption by a key distributor is often seen as an expression of validation among channel partners deciding whether to adopt new technologies from vendors with whom they might not otherwise be familiar.