As I mentioned in my last posting, Cisco held its annual Partner Summit reseller conference in San Diego last week. While the overall tone of the conference was positive, there was one issue that I felt was worth bringing up, as it could have some long-term impact on Cisco and its channel.
RELATED: Pros and cons of Cisco's current relationship with its partners. Read more
Last week, under the sunny skies of San Diego, Cisco held its annual reseller Partner Summit. The setting was fitting as the show itself indicated that there are sunnier skies ahead for Cisco and its Partners. Read more
Cisco has a vast partner network (some 60,000 worldwide, including 12,000 high-end Certified Partners) and this network accounts for more than 80 percent of Cisco’s product and services revenue ($28B in 2009). Yet when you talk to an average Cisco partner, they will tell you they make almost nothing on the sale of Cisco’s own products and services, and all their own money on the professional services they offer along with the Cisco products – configuration, installation, and technical support. Read more
Cisco has streamlined how multinational customers deal with its resellers. The irony is that the new method has made it easier for customers to do business but appears to be somewhat complicated for resellers. Read more
A court judge's ruling on Cisco's reseller agreement could set off a flurry of lawsuits from partners who believe their business has been harmed by the network giant's Indirect Channel Partner Agreement (ICPA). Judge Gregory H. Read more
Not that they would say otherwise, but the Cisco resellers cited in ChannelWeb's story about the impending Brocade/Foundry wedding said they were not afraid of the union. Raphe Reeves, vice president of Cisco operations at Norcross, Ga. Read more
Cisco partners need to contribute $20 billion in new business over the coming years to help the network giant meet CEO John Chambers' aggressive long term growth plan of 12% to 17% the next three to five years, according to a story in ChannelWeb. ChannelWeb cites from a keynote address given by Cisco channel chief Keith Goodwin at the company's Partner Summit last week: "There are two ways to we could do that. We could recruit thousands of new partners, but that's not our strategy. Read more
Cisco India wrapped up its first Cisco Developer Forum Friday, an event that was "focused on the network as a development platform," according to Cisco India. The two-day conference included technical sessions and hands-on demonstrations covering applications in unified communications, customer contact center, voice gateway, data center, network management and wireless technologies. Read more
Cisco Subnet has been following Cisco - the company, its personalities and the individuals who work in the Cisco industry - since we launched the Cisco Subnet Community in February. We're witnessing Cisco morphing into a software firm - with an emphasis on social networking for enterprises - and we've been following its ups and downs as it tries to broaden itself away from relying on its traditional bead-and-butter network plumbing gear. Thank you, dear reader, for joining us on the Cisco ride. We've collected the year's most-read Cisco Subnet Community items for your pleasure. Read more
Cisco distributor Tech Data is offering to its North American resellers Cisco's Try and Buy program, reports eChannelLine. The program allows resellers to demonstrate cisco products for a trial period before deciding to purchase it.
Resellers can play with Cisco equipment on their own networks for up to 60 days, at the end of which, they can return it or buy it.
Further reading: Check out Cisco Subnet's ChannelSurfing with Ken Presti blog.
| As Cisco's newly authorized distributor in the United States, ScanSource hits home run with information packed website.
Mike Baur, president and CEO of ScanSource, has built an excellent website to service the Cisco channel as a specialty distributor for mobility technologies in key vertical markets. ScanSource is promoting and distributing to resellers Cisco's unified wireless network products and solutions in the growing wireless market. |
ScanSource Cisco resources:
Unified Communications - SMB Resources
Unfortunately, publicly held ScanSource appears to be suffering from a backdating stock option issue with the SEC and may face delisting by NASDAQ.