Microsoft commits multibillion-dollar partner investments

 

Microsoft Corp. today unveiled updates to the Microsoft
Partner Network (MPN), to better help partners grow their businesses and meet
evolving technology needs of customers around the globe through tools, training
and incentives totaling $5.8 billion for fiscal year 2012.

 

Winning together with our partners today, and long into
the future, means delivering incredible world-class technologies to meet
customer needs, as well as the right partner incentives, tools and training,
which will ultimately drive business growth for them,” said Jon Roskill,
corporate vice president of the Worldwide Partner Group at Microsoft.

 

Microsoft announced
new or extended solutions and online service incentives that are available and
aligned to key priorities such as customer projects, accelerated growth of
public and private cloud adoption, and tools demonstrating a broad commitment
to partners’ success. Partners are encouraged to engage through the Microsoft
Partner Network to benefit from the incentives.

 

The newly separated Messaging
competency and Communications competency help differentiate companies with the
explicit skill set and depth of experience to provide a holistic unified
communications solution that includes voice and video. The competency split
also will enhance recognition for partners’ investments in advanced capabilities
with Exchange, Lync and Microsoft Office 365.

 

The merger of the Systems Management and Virtualization
competencies in May 2012 will strengthen partners’ ability to help customers
realize the benefits of cloud computing on their terms with Microsoft private
cloud solutions. Partners can prepare now by attaining the current competencies
for System Center management and Windows Server Hyper-V virtualization.

 

New Software Assurance Planning Services will be
available in August, paying qualified partners to deliver deployment services
to Microsoft Software Assurance customers for Microsoft private cloud, Windows
Azure public cloud, SQL Server and software development. These opportunities
will help partners grow their client base, strengthen customer relationships
and increase service revenues.

 

Windows Azure Incentives reward qualified partners in the
Windows Azure Circle program that influence customer adoption of Microsoft’s
public cloud platform. As a result, partners can build new, sustainable revenue
streams by helping customers benefit from the public cloud.

 

The Management and Virtualization Solution Incentive
Program will reward qualified Gold Certified partners that influence sales of
Microsoft private cloud technologies. This complements the Hyper-V Cloud Accelerate
program that will fund partner and customer private cloud assessments, proofs
of concept, and production deployments.

 

Monetary incentives and license mobility available
through Microsoft Software Assurance for Microsoft Hyper-V, System Center and
SQL Server will help hosting solution providers grow their businesses by
enabling customers to deploy their Server Application licenses with Software
Assurance on-premises or in the cloud within hosting partners’ shared hardware
environments.

 

Microsoft is investing in scaled business model
transformation approaches for high-potential partners (from in-person coaching
to online self-serve), which will help business decision-makers within partner
organizations build specific plans, analyze the change implications of
integrating cloud (e.g., profit and loss shifts, staffing needs, etc.), and
define commitments and a timeframe to execute the shift.

 

By TelecomLead.com Team
[email protected]