Kaushal Veluri
Director – Channel and Alliances, Citrix India
Given that the drive today is towards software-defined infrastructure, the evolution for Citrix is today at a stage where it is helping its customers to develop and set up a software-defined workspace for their organization. Its goal is to help customers accelerate their journey to this “mobility-transformed business†by enabling secure mobile workspaces and bring complete reinvention of facilities to make them more collaborative and gain increased operating efficiency.
“Customer experience has always been the core of our philosophy and our business. Over the last 25 years, we have acquired companies, made innovations in our technology and built it in such a manner that our focus has always been towards one simple thing – how do we help people to live better and work better,†asserts Kaushal Veluri , Director – Channel and Alliances, Citrix India. “Today, we believe that we have the ability to develop a software-defined workspace for the customer as we have a complete solution that will drive this and help customers set up that vision in their location as well,†he says.
Focus – Engage – Specialize
A 100% Channel-driven company, Citrix is making some great changes in the Citrix partner ecosystem that will impact its business and partner ecosystem, going forward. “We will always have a limited number of partners, somewhere between 65 and 75 partners. We work with partners who understand our philosophy, have the ability to build our entire solution and articulate and take this to the customer, thus driving our vision statement forward,†explains Kaushal.
This forms the genesis of Citrix’s three-pronged strategy, “Focus, Engage and Specializeâ€. Though this is an India-centric strategy, the Specialize part of it is driven from a Global programme. For the focus strategy, Citrix will focus on a few set of partners who will develop deeper interaction with customers and help them go along the solution journey. It has identified T2 partners like PC Solutions, Ricoh, Orient Technologies, Embee Software, Veeras Infotech, Frontier Business Systems and so on. Citrix also works very closely with SI partners like TCS, Wipro, Dimension Data and IBM. Then comes the Engage strategy, where Citrix shifts focus to its other set of partners, besides its Focussed Partners and engages very closely with its distribution partners, namely Redington and Avnet. “Whatever we do with the Focus set of partners is what we will get our distributors to work with our second set of partners,†Kaushal says. “And a similar type of methodology will apply on them too.â€
The third strategy, Specialize, is, however, the ultimate game changer that it brings into the entire Channel ecosystem, according to Citrix. In line with this strategy, Citrix has come out with the Technology Specialization Programme, launched earlier in the Citrix Partner Summit, through which a partner will be entitled to become either a Virtualization Specialist Partner or a Networking Specialist Partner or a Mobility Specialist Partner. He, however, needs to go through four critical steps to become a Technology Specialized Partner –
1. He should be having the latest Technology Certification
2. He should be attending four online courses on how to use Citrix tools
3. The partner has to give three customer validations where they have implemented Citrix technology
4. The partner has to take a practical exam
However, Citrix makes sure that it gives something in return to its partners for all the investments he has put in terms of money, time and effort. Its Advisory Reward Programme gives back-end rebate depending on the kind of deal. So while a regular Partner has the ability to earn 5-10% of the deal size as a back-end rebate, a technology specialized partner will earn 50% more on it.
Going ahead, 2015 promises to be a great year for Citrix. It will be a year that will lead to a lot of opportunities in the verticals of IT-ITeS, BFSI, Manufacturing, Telecom, Healthcare, Education and Government. Catching on this wave will be its partners that will grow along with Citirx and explore new areas like Software-Defined Workforce.
samrita@varindia.comCitrix extending Software-Defined Workforce vision with Partners
Kaushal Veluri
Director – Channel and Alliances, Citrix India
Given that the drive today is towards software-defined infrastructure, the evolution for Citrix is today at a stage where it is helping its customers to develop and set up a software-defined workspace for their organization. Its goal is to help customers accelerate their journey to this “mobility-transformed business†by enabling secure mobile workspaces and bring complete reinvention of facilities to make them more collaborative and gain increased operating efficiency.
“Customer experience has always been the core of our philosophy and our business. Over the last 25 years, we have acquired companies, made innovations in our technology and built it in such a manner that our focus has always been towards one simple thing – how do we help people to live better and work better,†asserts Kaushal Veluri , Director – Channel and Alliances, Citrix India. “Today, we believe that we have the ability to develop a software-defined workspace for the customer as we have a complete solution that will drive this and help customers set up that vision in their location as well,†he says.
Focus – Engage – Specialize
A 100% Channel-driven company, Citrix is making some great changes in the Citrix partner ecosystem that will impact its business and partner ecosystem, going forward. “We will always have a limited number of partners, somewhere between 65 and 75 partners. We work with partners who understand our philosophy, have the ability to build our entire solution and articulate and take this to the customer, thus driving our vision statement forward,†explains Kaushal.
This forms the genesis of Citrix’s three-pronged strategy, “Focus, Engage and Specializeâ€. Though this is an India-centric strategy, the Specialize part of it is driven from a Global programme. For the focus strategy, Citrix will focus on a few set of partners who will develop deeper interaction with customers and help them go along the solution journey. It has identified T2 partners like PC Solutions, Ricoh, Orient Technologies, Embee Software, Veeras Infotech, Frontier Business Systems and so on. Citrix also works very closely with SI partners like TCS, Wipro, Dimension Data and IBM. Then comes the Engage strategy, where Citrix shifts focus to its other set of partners, besides its Focussed Partners and engages very closely with its distribution partners, namely Redington and Avnet. “Whatever we do with the Focus set of partners is what we will get our distributors to work with our second set of partners,†Kaushal says. “And a similar type of methodology will apply on them too.â€
The third strategy, Specialize, is, however, the ultimate game changer that it brings into the entire Channel ecosystem, according to Citrix. In line with this strategy, Citrix has come out with the Technology Specialization Programme, launched earlier in the Citrix Partner Summit, through which a partner will be entitled to become either a Virtualization Specialist Partner or a Networking Specialist Partner or a Mobility Specialist Partner. He, however, needs to go through four critical steps to become a Technology Specialized Partner –
1. He should be having the latest Technology Certification
2. He should be attending four online courses on how to use Citrix tools
3. The partner has to give three customer validations where they have implemented Citrix technology
4. The partner has to take a practical exam
However, Citrix makes sure that it gives something in return to its partners for all the investments he has put in terms of money, time and effort. Its Advisory Reward Programme gives back-end rebate depending on the kind of deal. So while a regular Partner has the ability to earn 5-10% of the deal size as a back-end rebate, a technology specialized partner will earn 50% more on it.
Going ahead, 2015 promises to be a great year for Citrix. It will be a year that will lead to a lot of opportunities in the verticals of IT-ITeS, BFSI, Manufacturing, Telecom, Healthcare, Education and Government. Catching on this wave will be its partners that will grow along with Citirx and explore new areas like Software-Defined Workforce.
samrita@varindia.com
