IBM has announced that they are investing $1 billion to help partners and their customers capture the estimated $1 trillion hybrid-cloud market opportunity.
They are simplifying engagements, streamlining go-to-market strategies, and have designed specialized Build, Service and Sell tracks with tailored offers to help speed time to value. They have also recently unveiled new competencies, training to learn market-leading skills, and benefits to cultivate partner success in an increasingly competitive market.
In the Middle East, the company announced new and expanded partnerships with companies like Ingram Micro and Idea for Life, in addition to its long-standing partnerships with SBM in Saudi Arabia and GBM in the UAE.
The Middle East Virtual Business Partner Ecosystem Media Roundtable brought together experts from IBM and key regional partners to showcase how IBM work’s together to solve complex problems for clients and fuel hybrid cloud adoption across the region.
Andy Parkinson, VP, Partner Ecosystem, IBM Middle East and Africa said “IBM’s ecosystem is central to our growth strategy. IBM is investing $1 billion to help partners and their customers capture the $1 trillion hybrid-cloud market opportunity. Our push to deliver value for our partners includes significant investments and program enhancements geared at driving growth and enabling innovation in the region.”
Partners are at the center of IBM’s growth strategy. The company is committed to providing the resources and expertise to help partners get to market faster and grow their businesses. Through investing $1 billion globally, IBM aims to increase technical support, expand the toolkit of competencies by creating added value, and help partners benefit from funding tools:
Increase technical support
IBM shifted over 300 resources into Technical Partner Architect roles available in every market. These architects are specialized in different elements of the portfolio, analytics, security, automation, power systems and storage, among others. IBM’s Hybrid Cloud Build Team is also available for workload migration, building PoCs and solutions on IBM’s Hybrid Cloud Platform. There are currently over 100 active engagements across the world today with different partners.
Expand the framework of competencies for added value
IBM Competency Framework is based on market demand and designed to differentiate each partner’s specialization. This framework offers a unified design across build, service, and sell, allowing partners to benefit from a guided skills development.
IBM is expanding its competency portfolio with 10 new competencies and launching new role-based, guided learning journeys. A key new skill of the IBM Competency Framework is a training API that enables IBM courseware to be integrated into IBM partners’ firms’ learning system thus increasing the consumption of IBM education.
Benefits and funding tools
IBM continues to invest in financial incentives, maintaining the current offerings and adding new incentives for partners engaging in the build and service tracks, including a service engagement incentive and a PoC incentive.
