There was a reason Cisco announced its acquisition of Nuova and the new Nexus 5000 data center switch at its annual Partner Summit — the company is creating a new tier of reseller specifically for the network-centric data center.
Cisco is extending its Data Center Networking Infrastructure (DCNI) specialization to DCNI 2.0, which recognizes partners with a “highly qualified” data center practice. Cisco says DCNI 2.0 partners will be able to provide customers with “in-depth data center technology skills and a proven customer track record” in selling and deploying data center products and services.
Cisco will offer these partners enhanced financial incentives, such as the new Cisco Data Center Value Incentive Program (VIP), which rewards partners who invest in a business practice focused on the data center. Cisco is also rolling out the Data Center Partner Practice Builder, an outline of suggested approaches for building a Cisco-based practice.
The Practice Builder includes a step-by-step customer engagement model and associated resources designed to enable partners to sell, deliver, and support Cisco data center systems.
Cisco has also expanded its consulting and professional services to help customers migrate to its unified data center fabric vision, which combines 10Gbps Ethernet, FibreChannel over Ethernet (FCoE) and Data Center Ethernet (DCE) with Virtual Machine-optimized services. Cisco’s financing arm, Cisco Capital, is also offering customers specialized terms and options for data center development, including equipment purchase and leasing, technology migration and lifecycle management.
Eighty percent of Cisco’s business is done through the channel, according to Edison Peres, Cisco vice president of worldwide channels. The company sees a $14 billion opportunity for itself and its partners in data center revenue over the next five years.
Meanwhile, Cisco says it does not intend to sunset its existing “top of rack” data center switches with the advent of the Nexus 5000. The Catalyst 4948 and 4900M are intended to address 1Gbps Ethernet and transitions to 10Gbps Ethernet applications that do not require a unified fabric, says Dante Malagrino, director of product marketing for Cisco Data Center Solutions.
The Nexus 5000 is a 56-port Layer 2 switch that features 40 fixed configuration ports of 10Gbps Ethernet/FCoE/DCE, and two expansion slots. The expansion slots can house a six-port unifed fabric — 10GbE/FCoE/DCE — card; an eight-port 1G, 2G or 4Gbps FibreChannel card; and a card that mixes four-port of unified fabric with four ports of FibreChannel interfaces.
