CRN February 2023 - Issue 1418

CEO OUTLOOK 2023

PAGE 14

CHANNEL CHIEFS 2023

PAGE 20

THE SECURITY 100

PAGE 58

THE CLOUD 1OO

PAGE 68

NEWS, ANALYSIS AND PERSPECTIVE FOR VARs AND TECHNOLOGY INTEGRATORS

The Year Of The Channel

Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora spent over four years transforming the security giant’s product portfolio, and now he says it’s time for him to have a more visible role with partners. ‘This year is going to be all about go-to-market and the channel, and they’ll be surprised to find me,’ he tells CRN. PAGE 8

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The Year Of The Channel

Palo

CEO Outlook

We asked, they answered. A number of the industry’s prominent technology CEOs provide insight into where they are placing their bets this year and how they are banking on partners to help them tackle emerging opportunities.

THE CHANNEL FACTOR Be Bold, Get Strategic

NOW IS THE TIME for channel chiefs to

be bold.

As uncertainty around the global economy continues to swirl and companies across the tech industry make headlines left and right with layoffs by the thousands, it might be tempting to hunker down and play it safe when it comes to channel partnerships: Stick with what you know, maintain the status quo. But in reality, times such as these create a tremendous opportunity for technology manufacturers to gain both mindshare and market share within the channel for those daring enough to grab them.

Winners and losers in the Everything-as-a-Service revolution will be decided during this downturn as customers gravitate toward more cost-effective, efficient and flexible solutions and Capex-only deals continue to lose their luster.

That’s why it’s critical for technology vendors to do everything in their power to position themselves as strategic partners to the solution providers they work with rather than just building transactional relationships. That means creating new services opportunities, offering tighter collaboration, sharing quality leads, or any of a number of other things that prove valuable to channel partners.

about how vendors such as Amazon Web Services and VMware, among others, are taking steps to drive closer alignment and bolster services opportunities for the channel, moves that stand to benefit both sides of the partnership.

The “smart” vendors will move past the knee-jerk tendency to pull back from channel investments in uncertain economic times and instead leverage the channel’s wealth of talent, according to Scott Winslow, president and founder of Waltham, Mass.-based Winslow Technology Group.

“We have sales, engineering, marketing, finance services, managed services folks that we are employing on our payroll that are available to our [vendor] partners. What better way for them to become more efficient themselves than to do more with a channel?” Winslow said in the article.

We asked our Channel Chiefs honorees for up to three of their top channel goals for 2023. The top three answers— each selected by roughly 33 percent of respondents—were adding more qualified partners, increasing the number of netnew accounts coming through partners, and increasing the overall percentage of revenue that comes through the channel.

Times such as these create a tremendous opportunity for technology manufacturers to gain both mindshare and market share within the channel for those daring enough to grab them.

In our cover story on Palo Alto Networks on p. 8, CRN Senior Editor Kyle Alspach looks at the journey the security company has embarked on to transform its product line since naming Nikesh Arora as its chairman and CEO in 2018. Now that Arora has assembled the cloud services portfolio he wants, he’s ready to focus on the go-to-market strategy in general and the channel in particular.

Solution providers told CRN they are already reaping the benefits of the security vendor’s efforts, which have created high-margin growth opportunities in professional and managed services for the channel. Multiple partners throughout the piece describe the ways Palo Alto Networks has shifted to make itself a more strategic partner for them.

Meanwhile, in CRN’s 2023 Channel Chiefs project, featured on p. 20, our reporters talked to a slew of solution providers

Sitting just below those at Nos. 4 and 5 were improving partner profitability (29 percent of responses) and increasing the amount of recurring revenue going through partners (27 percent).

While the first three could be interpreted as channel executives focusing heavily on what partners can do for them, the next two certainly point to awareness that it’s also critical to focus on what vendors can do for the channel.

What’s also essential is to not only become a more strategic technology partner to the channel but also to communicate that strategic sales strategy to them to drive partner engagement.

Fortune favors the bold, as the adage goes. In 2023, the boldest channel executives will get strategic. n

BACKTALK: Do you have a good story about how a technology vendor has made itself more strategic to you? Share it with me at jfollett@thechannelcompany.com.

THE FINAL CUT AWS’ Cloud Technology Leadership Makes Its Channel Unique

IF YOU WANT TO KNOW what makes Amazon Web Services’ channel so unique you need look no further than AWS Global Systems Integrator Partner of the Year Classmethod.

Classmethod beat out AWS systems integrators more than 100 times its size because of its engineering prowess and unprecedented commitment to keep pace with the fast-moving AWS cloud innovation juggernaut.

The Classmethod business model, in fact, is to stay in lockstep with AWS in pushing the cloud technology envelope at a relentless pace to drive breakthrough productivity, cost and competitive advantages for customers. That, of course, is where the highest margins are for partners.

The systems integrator’s secret sauce is its technology thought leadership. That can also be said for AWS, with CEO Adam Selipsky and Vice President of Worldwide Channels and Alliances Ruba Borno driving forward AWS’ unique channel advantage.

Classmethod’s DevelopersIO website with more than 40,000 technical articles acts as an open-source clearinghouse of sorts for customers looking for answers to hard-to-solve cloud issues. The Tokyo-based company’s 500-plus engineers—who make up 71 percent of its employees—do deep drill-downs into AWS technology in blog posts each day.

In 2022, Classmethod provided technical support to over 18,000 AWS accounts with more than 200 technical case studies on its corporate website. That means that the company stays up to date on all things AWS.

For seven consecutive years, Classmethod has obtained Premier Tier Services Partner status from AWS—the highest in that category. In addition, Classmethod employees hold well over 2,200 AWS certifications. That AWS certification depth and breadth put it ahead of systems integrators many times its size in annual revenue.

Customers know that when they go to Classmethod’s DevelopersIO website for answers on any and all kinds of cloud challenges—including the latest AWS innovation—they will not be disappointed.

More than 1 million unique users visit the Classmethod website each month, with many of them going on to hire the AWS superstar as their primary cloud consultant and integrator. The Classmethod model is a lead generation machine that provides a constant flow of new customers.

In fact, Classmethod, with its 100 sales reps, generates more sales opportunities than nearly every other AWS systems integrator.

“The culture of Classmethod is technology thought leadership for the benefit of all,” said Chris Sullivan, general manager of worldwide systems integrators and strategic alliances at AWS. “The company publishes all of its technical content on its website. Customers come to their website for answers and then engage with them based on their technology thought leadership.”

Sullivan is a huge fan of Classmethod, crediting the company with an uncanny ability to leverage AWS’ cloud services to solve customer problems in new and innovative ways. “We innovate every day, and Classmethod is right beside us,” he said.

BACKTALK: What is your winning formula for success in the cloud? Let me know at sburke@thechannelcompany.com.

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Startups Are Coming To The Rescue

These 10 startups have rolled out new products that are solving niche storage issues or tackling critical challenges that haven’t yet been resolved.

1. 22DOT6 226-212NSS

Bozeman, Mont.-based 22dot6 is rolling out its new 2U, 12-bay highperformance 226-212NSS hybrid storage system. Designed for the new Intel Xeon-D 1700 SoC-based motherboard architecture, it comes with two 25-Gbit network cards plus four Gigabit Ethernet ports native as well as 12 3.5-inch bays in front that support a U.3 backplane for use with NVMe or SAS drives. With its NVMe/SAS SSD and hard-drive support, it allows flexible true active/ active and active/passive multitier support.

2.

IODYNE PRO DATA

Mill Valley, Calif.-based Iodyne’s Pro Data storage device is an all-NVMe all-SSD Thunderbolt RAID device combining multiple SSDs and eight 40-Gbit Thunderbolt ports in a single enclosure. The Pro Data is protected by RAID-6 and AES-XTS-256 encryption and can be connected to multiple PCs in a workgroup. It is available in 12-TB, 24-TB or 48-TB capacities.

3. INTERNXT DRIVE

Internxt Drive from Valencia, Spainbased Internxt, is an open-source, zero-knowledge cloud-based storage service which, because the company is based in Europe, offers full privacy features including user-coded decryption. Files uploaded to Internxt Drive are first encrypted on the client side and then fragmented into independent shards that are stored on servers distributed around the world.

4. ICEDRIVE

Icedrive from the Swansea, U.K.-based company of the same name is a cloud-based storage offering that uses twofish encryption, which the company said is more secure than the commonly used Rigndael algorithm-based AES encryption. Everything, including file and folder names, are encrypted on the client device before being moved to the cloud. Plans start from $20 per year for 150 GB to a one-time $999 payment for lifetime 10 TB.

5. NEXUSTORAGE NEXFS

Nexfs intelligent software-defined storage from Wellington, New Zealandbased Nexustorage unifies block, file, cloud and object storage technologies, combining up to three tiers of storage into a massively scalable single pool of storage with data protection and automated data life-cycle management. The software, which works with standard x86 server hardware, can be licensed in capacities from 10 TB to 1PB.

6. NODEUM DATA MANAGEMENT

Liege, Belgium-based startup Nodeum is the developer of Nodeum Data Management software, which runs on the Linux platform and commodity hardware to provide a platform to optimize data movement, move inactive data to the secondary storage of choice, and virtualize data so it can be accessed and synced from anywhere.

7. NVISIONX NX PLATFORM

The Nvisionx Nx Platform from Santa Monica, Calif.-based Nvisionx is a data intelligence platform that combines storage, analytics and security. The platform analyzes all business data and correlates cyberintelligence to help businesses contextually classify data, provide the right protection, purge stale and toxic data, and minimize cybersecurity and compliance risks.

8. PLIOPS XDP-ROCKS

Pliops, based in San Jose, Calif., in November unveiled the Pliops XDP-Rocks, a version of the company’s Pliops Extreme Data Processor, or XDP, aimed at overcoming architecture limitations of traditional RocksDB deployments. XDP-Rocks can increase throughput by 20X while reducing tail latency by 100X and normalized CPU by 10X in RocksDB-based databases.

9. SOLIDIGM P44 PRO SSD

The P44 Pro SSD was introduced in October by Solidigm, a San Jose, Calif.-based SSD startup launched in December 2021 when Intel decided to sell its SSD business, some NAND SSD technology and a NAND facility to SK Hynix. The P44 Pro offers PCIe 4.0 performance with up to 7,000MBps sequential read speeds while drawing just 5.3 watts. It is available in 512-GB, 1-TB and 2-TB capacities.

10. WULT

Wult is a Copenhagen, Denmark-based builder of a platform by the same name that provides real-time data compliance automation to help address companywide governance, risk and compliance. It includes data mapping to get a full view of all data in all silos, automates how third-party vendors interact with data and helps control employee data. ■

The Year Of The Channel

Palo

In December, a few months after onShore Security had joined Palo Alto Networks’ managed security services provider program, the Chicago-based MSSP received what founder and CEO Stel Valavanis could only describe as “manna from heaven.”

That month, onShore received the first of three highly valuable customer leads from the cybersecurity titan, all for opportunities involving the vendor’s Prisma Access offering for zero trust network access. OnShore has done far more business with other cybersecurity vendors in the past and never gotten a single lead from them, so being handed three leads in a manner of weeks, Valavanis said, “is unheard of.”

He is now expecting Chicago-based onShore’s revenue with Palo Alto Networks to more than double in 2023 from last year. And he’s got a message for other MSPs and MSSPs: “Don’t assume that big, giant Palo Alto [Networks] is out of your reach.”

In recent years, Palo Alto Networks has moved aggressively to expand its product portfolio beyond its signature next-generation firewall offerings, a move that is now creating major opportunities for a wider range of partners, executives from multiple solution providers that work with the vendor told CRN

For one thing, the cloud- and zero-trust-focused platform now being offered by Palo Alto Networks requires a lot of additional services from the channel to implement, solution providers said. Offering security to customers with distributed workforces “adds a level of complexity that you have to design around,” Valavanis said. “It’s not the same as just putting up a firewall somewhere.”

This expanded Palo Alto Networks portfolio is creating huge opportunities for high-margin growth in managed and professional services, solution providers said. For example, at Cleveland-based Advizex, the IT services powerhouse is expecting revenue from its Palo Alto Networks business to grow by 80 percent to 90 percent this year over last year, CTO Chris Miller said.

And like at onShore, the team at Advizex, No. 104 on the 2022 CRN Solution Provider 500, has seen Palo Alto Networks go the extra mile to team up on prospective deals.

Case in point: After providing some basic cybersecurity services to a large manufacturer in the Midwest, Advizex had been working to land a more extensive deal with the customer. Now, the solution provider is closer to achieving its goal after Palo Alto Networks intervened on its behalf, according to Advizex President C.R. Howdyshell.

Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora spent over four years transforming the security giant’s product portfolio, and now he says it’s time for him to have a more visible role with partners. ‘This year is going to be all about go-to-market and the channel, and they’ll be surprised to find me,’ he tells CRN.

“Palo [Alto Networks] said, ‘Hey, we know you guys. Let’s go at this together.’ And they went to the customer with that recommendation,” Howdyshell said. “That doesn’t happen with a lot of other partners.”

Palo Alto Networks executives told CRN that 2023 is all about bringing its work with the channel to the next level as it seeks wider customer adoption of its newer products, which span from cloud and application security to zero trust and secure access service edge (SASE) to extended detection and response (XDR) and automated security operations.

Among other things, this partner push will mean Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora will be taking a more visible role in the vendor’s channel efforts. In a recent interview with CRN, Arora said that channel partners may be “surprised” by how much they see of him going forward.

“We’ve taken four and a half years to get to a place where we believe we have a robust product portfolio in the most relevant categories of today,” Arora told CRN in December at the company’s 2022 Ignite conference. That has meant spending 70 percent of his time focusing on the product portfolio, leaving other executives to worry about the go-to-market and channel strategy, he said.

“If I didn’t fix the product portfolio, it wouldn’t matter if I had a good channel strategy or a bad one, so I spent my time [on products],” Arora said, likening himself to a doctor who had to triage the damage. “People didn’t see me in the channel because I was busy fixing the broken elbow and the bleeding arm.”

Now that the portfolio he envisioned is a reality, Arora said his focus over the next three years will shift to spending 70 percent of his time “to make sure we actually take all these products to market and upsell all of our customers into a better security proposition.”

That will include a lot more involvement with initiatives that impact the channel, he told CRN. More than 95 percent of the security vendor’s revenue is generated through its partners. “[This] year is going to be all about go-to-market and the channel,” Arora said, “and they’ll be surprised to find me.”

Focus On Transformation

Formerly the chief business officer at Google and president of prominent investment firm SoftBank Group, Arora landed at Palo Alto Networks as chairman and CEO in June 2018. From the start, Arora recalled having “transformation” on his mind— transformation of the vendor’s product offerings and, over time, of the company itself.

“When I came to Palo Alto Networks, I said, ‘We have two

years to transform our product portfolio. Otherwise, we run the risk of being yet another cybersecurity company which [loses relevance],’” Arora told CRN. And so in the years since, “I spent a disproportionate amount of my time focusing on fi xing our product portfolio,” he said.

Without question, the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company has reinvented itself under Arora’s leadership. In less than five years, it’s shifted from being known predominantly as an on-premises network security vendor into becoming the provider of a full platform for modern cybersecurity. The product lines that have been built out under Arora’s leadership include Prisma SASE and Prisma Access to provide secure remote access to applications; Prisma Cloud for application and cloud security; and Cortex for endpoint security, XDR and machine-learning-powered security operations.

The Palo Alto Networks portfolio today brings together numerous best-of-breed tools to form a “robust endto-end platform that can solve nearly all the issues that we’re seeing in cybersecurity,” said Mark Jones, founder and CEO of Austin, Texas-based BlackLake Security, No. 270 on the 2022 CRN Solution Provider 500. “I’m not saying that they’re the one-stop shop, but they’re very close to it.”

Jones gives much of the credit to the vendor’s leadership team and to Arora in particular: “The guy understands the market. He’s not chasing the ball—he’s well ahead of it.”

Competing players in network security didn’t move as quickly to transition to the cloud and embrace zero trust and didn’t invest in these areas as effectively as did Palo Alto Networks, solution providers said. “Over the years, they keep making the right acquisitions at the right time,” Jones said.

While the company had already begun its cloud transition prior to Arora’s hiring, including through acquisitions such as Evident.io, the pace of technology acquisition picked up after his arrival. Starting with the acquisition of cloud security startup RedLock a few months after he joined, Palo Alto Networks has completed 14 acquisitions under Arora so far, according to the company.

The series of acquisitions has endowed the Prisma and Cortex offerings with the majority of functionality that’s considered essential in today’s pandemic-altered security landscape, solution providers said.

The Palo Alto Networks platform, in other words, is “literally a single pane of glass for 99 percent of what you’d want to do on your network,” said Max Shier, CISO of Denver-based Optiv, No. 25 on the 2022 CRN Solution Provider 500. “That is pretty ground-breaking.”

“When I came to Palo Alto Networks, I said, ‘We have two years to transform our product portfolio. Otherwise, we run the rist of being yet another security company which [loses relevance].’”

—Nikesh Arora, Charirman, CEO, Palo Alto Networks

In addition to choosing its startup acquisition targets wisely, Palo Alto Networks has been skillful at integrating its acquired technology into a cohesive platform, according to Chuck Crawford, senior vice president of solutions architecture at Kansas City, Mo.-based Cyderes.

“It’s one thing that we see a lot of other large companies fail at—the mergers and acquisitions of products into their portfolios tend to stay siloed,” Crawford said. “Palo [Alto Networks] did a really great job of integrating all those solutions in one place.”

Channel More Pivotal Than Ever

In recent months, Palo Alto Networks has unveiled updates to its channel partner program, NextWave, that aim to enable partners to sell more of the portfolio.

“When we look at our data, the partners who are growing the fastest are the ones that have branched out beyond fi rewalls,” said Tom Evans, who was named vice president of worldwide channel sales in December after former channel chief Karl Soderlund took a new role leading Palo Alto Networks’ North America ecosystem organization. “Our answer to [partners] is, ‘If you want to make more money, you want to sell more, you want to grow more, you want to have more opportunities to deliver services—sell the rest of the portfolio,’” Evans said.

The strategy with NextWave is to tailor channel enablement based on each partner’s business model. The program includes five distinct “paths” for partners depending on whether they’re predominantly a solution provider (focused on offering specialized expertise in products and services); an MSSP; a services partner (for consulting, professional or risk liability services); a distributor; or a cloud service provider (focused on marketplace transactions).

According to Larry Fulop, senior vice president of marketing and technology at Phoenix-based MicroAge, the move to “put a unique partner program in for each of us is a great strategy.” Given the vastly different partner types today, “I think that’s the right way to go,” Fulop said.

On the whole, Palo Alto Networks is “becoming much more specific on the solutions themselves and how partners can drive those services,” Evans said. That includes efforts to help partners with building a services practice, based on their partner type, and providing guidance about how partners can bundle together multiple solutions and compete more effectively with single-function point products from other vendors, he said.

“We’re heavily focused on teaching our partners how they can

drive those solutions and how our solutions complement each other,” Evans said.

The channel program shift to encourage partners to sell a broader piece of the portfolio dovetails with the platform developments that have made Palo Alto Networks now highly appealing to the growing number of customers who’d prefer to consolidate down to fewer security vendors, according to solution providers.

Many businesses have been struggling with complexity in their security architectures due to an overabundance of tools for cyberdefense, an issue that’s referred to as “tool sprawl.” Consolidating vendors can potentially reduce this complexity while cutting costs as well. Fewer vendors also means fewer skilled security professionals—who are perpetually in short supply—are needed to learn and operate the tools.

The current customer appetite for tool consolidation is one reason why Palo Alto Networks is coming to rely more heavily on partners, Arora said.

“Our customers are realizing they need to get rid of the point products that they have in the infrastructure. They need to go toward a more consolidated solution outcome. And that solution outcome requires a transformation at each customer’s end,” he said.

Customers can’t find the security talent to do this on their own, however, Arora said. And Palo Alto Networks doesn’t have the resources to “transform every customer” either. For that work, “I need to rely on a partner. And the partner is the channel,” he said. “I need all of their support to make that transformation happen.”

All in all, “the channel is becoming more relevant in the new world of cybersecurity,” Arora said.

Helping customers to consolidate on Palo Alto Networks has been a regular occurrence lately at CDW, according to Stephanie Hagopian, vice president of cybersecurity solutions at the Lincolnshire, Ill.-based solution provider giant, No. 4 on the 2022 CRN Solution Provider 500. She cited a number of recent cases where customers added an assortment of Prisma and Cortex products when their firewall contracts came up for renewal.

Those included a customer in the gaming and entertainment industry that recently tripled the size of its contract for Palo Alto Networks offerings at renewal time. Likewise, a customer in the utilities industry recently “bought everything under the Palo [Alto Networks] umbrella” at renewal time for its firewalls, she said. In all of these instances, the teams at CDW and Palo Alto Networks were working side-by-side to showcase the value of using more of the platform, Hagopian said.

“Our answer to partners is, ‘If you want to make more money, you want to sell more, you want to grow more, you want to have more opportunities to deliver services— sell the rest of the portfolio.’”

As weaker economic conditions take hold, the demand for cost-saving consolidation is only likely to accelerate, according to Jones of BlackLake Security, which recently helped an oil and gas industry customer replace multiple tools by consolidating on the Palo Alto Networks platform.

“We’re placing our bets on Palo Alto Networks as a company,” Jones said. “Because of the acquisitions they’ve made that have been so clutch, I think they are going to reap the benefits now in this environment.”

Meanwhile, intensifying cyberthreats, requirements by cyber insurance providers and increasing regulations are a few of the factors that could keep spending on cybersecurity more resilient than other areas of the economy.

For Palo Alto Networks’ fi scal fi rst quarter of 2023, which ended Oct. 31, 2022, revenue and profit beat analyst forecasts, and the company raised its financial guidance, all despite the weakening economy. Those results—including year-over-year revenue growth of 25 percent to reach $1.56 billion—led to gains in its stock price, even as other top security vendors saw their stock price sink after falling short of Wall Street expectations amid macroeconomic challenges.

Among publicly traded stand-alone cybersecurity vendors, Palo Alto Networks boasted the highest market capitalization as of this writing, at $47.96 billion.

The ‘New Perimeter’

While the company doesn’t disclose revenue by product segment, its zero trust and SASE offerings appear to be gaining the most traction with partners and customers among the newer solution set. Channel chief Evans said that right now, “SASE is definitely the No. 1 thing partners are talking to me about [for their] expansion.”

Indeed, for ePlus Technology, No. 30 on the 2022 CRN Solution Provider 500, Prisma Access and Prisma SASE are seeing the strongest customer adoption so far among the newer Palo Alto Networks products, said Lee Waskevich, vice president of security at the Herndon, Va.-based solution provider. That’s in part because implementing these solutions is a natural step for many customers that use the vendor’s next-generation firewalls but now want to provide secure remote access to distributed workforces, leveraging zero trust principles rather than VPNs and firewalls, he said.

Prisma Access includes security capabilities such as zero trust network access in place of a VPN, and cloud access security broker to protect their use of SaaS apps. Prisma SASE provides a combined security and networking offering through the addition

of SD-WAN. Palo Alto Networks is considered a “single-vendor” SASE provider thanks to delivering all of the core capabilities that are needed for deploying a SASE architecture, according to research firm Gartner.

“SASE naturally lends itself to being that intermediary layer, the same way that the next-gen firewalls from before were at that perimeter,” Waskevich said. “SASE becomes that new perimeter, that new layer, where you can connect from anywhere [and get] secure access to your applications, whether they’re on-prem or in the cloud.”

The Prisma SASE platform is also tailored to meet the needs of MSPs, offering multiple capabilities specially designed for them, according to Palo Alto Networks. The company’s interest in working with MSPs—even smaller companies like onShore Security, which employs 25—is only likely to grow, according to onShore’s Valavanis.

With offerings like Prisma Access and Prisma SASE, Palo Alto Networks knows “they need some kind of service provider— not just a VAR,” he said.

“They need to be able to add on the services along the way.”

Prisma Cloud, meanwhile, provides offerings for securing applications and the cloud or hybrid cloud infrastructure that runs them. And that platform has huge potential for the channel as well, including for serving customers that operate hybrid infrastructure, solution providers said.

The cloud-native application protection platform offers capabilities such as protection for cloud workloads, container security, monitoring for misconfigurations and, most recently, security for code and the software supply chain.

“Palo Alto [Networks] made a tremendous investment in advance of cloud workloads coming into play—and in particular, the integration between hybrid environments,” said Rocco Galletto, a partner and national cybersecurity leader at Toronto-based BDO Canada. For customers with both on-premises and cloud environments, “they do a fantastic job” in providing security capabilities across environments, Galletto said.

In addition, the introduction of code and software supply chain security now enables Prisma Cloud to secure every part of an application and its associated development process—or from “code to cloud,” as Palo Alto Networks has termed it. That’s a growing priority for many organizations in the wake of critical open-source vulnerabilities such as Log4Shell and software supply chain attacks such as 2020’s SolarWinds breach.

Crucially, this type of platform balances the development team’s needs—to fit code security into their workflows—with the security team’s need for visibility into the process, said Katie Norton, a

‘SASE naturally lends itself to being that intermediary layer, the same way that the next-gen rewalls from before were at that perimeter. SASE becomes that new perimeter, that new layer, where you can connect from anywhere [and get] secure access to your applications ’

Lee Waskevich, VP, Security, ePlus Technology

senior research analyst at IDC. Through that approach, “you’re striking that balance that’s needed to bring those two disciplines together effectively.”

Data-Driven Security

Rounding out its newer portfolio is the Cortex line of products, which includes EDR and its more recent successor, XDR.

Nir Zuk, who founded Palo Alto Networks in 2005 and remains its CTO, coined the term XDR in 2018. XDR is seen as a major step forward in thwarting cyberattacks because it brings together data from numerous security tools, devices and environments for improved threat analysis and prioritization. Attackers typically move between systems and environments, Zuk observed—and so data needs to be correlated across all of them, which is what XDR seeks to do.

While many competing vendors have latched on to XDR in recent years, Palo Alto Networks not only pioneered the concept but also remains a top provider, thanks in part to having such a broad range of its own tools that can feed data into the analytics engine, solution providers said.

The more data you have, the better your decisionmaking can be around responding to threats, and Palo Alto Networks excels at doing this with its XDR approach, according to Logicalis US’ Brad Davenport. “They were really hot out of the gate in bringing that capability to market, and that has been a huge differentiator for them,” said Davenport, vice president of technical architecture for cybersecurity, networking and collaboration at the Bloomfield Hills, Mich.-based company, No. 66 on the 2022 CRN Solution Provider 500.

Palo Alto Networks also specializes in automating the Security Operations Center with its Cortex platform. Among the vendor’s most discussed new offerings is Cortex XSIAM (extended security intelligence and automation management), which the company has touted as an “autonomous SOC” platform. Generally available as of October, Cortex XSIAM aims to rapidly detect and respond to a greater number of threats than was previously possible.

At Chicago-based Ahead, security operations tools such as SIEM have never been a focus in the past. But the Cortex autonomous SOC platform is “a very interesting play,” said Dustin Grimmeissen, senior director of technical specialists at Ahead, No. 32 on the 2022 CRN Solution Provider 500.

With the platform, Palo Alto Networks is “challenging the status quo on the traditional SIEM-SOC service using more realtime data feeds, more automation, more machine-learning-type analytics—to make decisions quicker and to automate some of

the response,” Grimmeissen said.

Taken together, Palo Alto Networks is now offering a platform that can replace practically all of the major security tools, solution providers said, with just a few exceptions such as identity security.

According to Arora, the once-popular conclusion by some in the security industry that “nobody wants a consolidated platform” was premature. “There has never been one offered,” he said. “So how would you know?” In today’s security environment, “I think the market is ripe for a platform because the older [approaches] haven’t worked,” Arora said. “And if you crack that code, I think the sky’s the limit.”

His goal is to double revenue within the next three to four years, which he acknowledged would require more than 20 percent growth throughout that time frame. That’s a rate that would be no small feat to maintain as the company grows in size. Revenue for its most recently completed fiscal year, which ended July 31, 2022, was $5.5 billion, up 29 percent from the prior year.

Arora made it clear that he intends to rely on the channel for driving this ambitious growth. But in reality, there’s no other way to do it, he noted: Serving customers today is no longer just about selling them physical firewalls, which the customer could potentially set up itself. “You can’t do that on SASE. You need implementation capability,” he said. “That’s where the channel has been great in the last four or five years—transforming themselves to build that capability.”

Without a doubt, partners are “getting more solution-oriented and services-oriented. And it’s our job to make sure we have ample resources [to be] partnering with them to make sure that our strategy is amplified,” he said. “Because now our products lend themselves to more transformational [projects] with our customers, which do require a significant services capability with our partner ecosystem.”

Ultimately, Palo Alto Networks now has a platform for enabling transformation across the three biggest areas of cybersecurity today—cloud, zero trust and security operations, according to Arora.

“Our product portfolio is in place. The customers are trying to solve those three big problems,” he said. “I think the real opportunity for 2023 is to really start transforming our go-to-market capabilities to deliver that transformation to our customers.”

And more than ever before at Palo Alto Networks, he said, “the partner ecosystem is the key catalyst, enabler and amplifier of our ability to deliver those solutions.”

‘ ey were really hot out of the gate in bringing that [XDR] capability to market, and that has been a huge di erentiator for them.’

What is your strategy for Palo Alto Networks in 2023?

We’ve taken four and a half years to get to a place where we believe we have a robust product portfolio in the most relevant categories of today.Whether it’s cloud transformation with Prisma Cloud, whether it’s network transformation with our zero trust capability across hardware, software, SASE [secure access service edge]. Or it is the beginning of the SOC [Security Operations Center] transformation strategy—to take people to more real-time protection, from what I think is reactive protection. So our product portfolio is in place. The customers are trying to solve those three big problems. I think the real opportunity for 2023 is to really start transforming our go-to-market capabilities to deliver that transformation to our customers. And I’d say the last three or four years, I’ve spent 70 percent of my time on product to get our portfolio working with [Chief Product Officer] Lee [Klarich]. And the next three years I’m going to spend 70 percent of my time with [President] BJ Jenkins to make sure we actually take all these products to market and upsell all of our customers into a better security proposition.

What’s your long-term vision for the channel?

The channel is becoming more relevant in the new world of cybersecurity. The reason is our customers are realizing they need to get rid of the point products that they have in the infrastructure. They need to go toward a more consolidated solution outcome. And that solution outcome requires a transformation at each customer’s end. But customers don’t have the resources. We’ve heard about the cybersecurity [talent] shortage. So they rely on somebody else. I don’t have the resources to go transform every customer. I have resources to build great products. But to create that transformation capability, I need to rely on a partner. And the partner is the channel. And the channel—[whether it’s] the system integrators, the traditional channel partners, the [service providers] as well as [cloud service providers]—I need all of their support to make that transformation happen. … They’re more important because it’s no longer selling a box that the customer needs to implement. In the past, we sold boxes. The boxes were taken

by the channel and delivered to the customer. The customers typically had some of their own engineers or channel support to do the deployment. You can’t do that on SASE—you need implementation capability. You can’t do that on [managed detection and response]. You need managed services capability. That’s where the channel has been great in the last four or five years—transforming themselves to build that capability.

Since joining Palo Alto Networks, how involved would you say you’ve been with channel-related issues? How would you respond to those who suggest you haven’t been very visible in the channel?

When you are a triage doctor and somebody rushes in and they have a bleeding arm and a broken bone—you focus all your attention on the bleeding arm and the broken bone. You don’t pay attention to the eczema they have on their leg or other issues that are not as urgent. When I came to Palo Alto Networks, I said, ‘We have two years to transform our product portfolio. Otherwise, we run the risk of being yet another cybersecurity company which [loses relevance].’ I spent a disproportionate amount of my time focusing on fixing our product portfolio. Think about it—we built SASE, we built Prisma Cloud, we built Cortex. I had to learn the product industry to be able to make those decisions and buy those things … I let BJ Jenkins, [Chief Business Officer] Amit Singh, [President of North America Sales] Rick Congdon, [Senior Vice President of Ecosystems] Don Jones worry about go-to-market and channel. Because if I didn’t fix the product portfolio, it wouldn’t matter if I had a good channel strategy or a bad one. So I spent my time there. People didn’t see me in the channel because I was busy fixing the broken elbow and the bleeding arm. Now, as I said, the next year is going to be all about go-to-market and the channel, and they’ll be surprised to find me. But once you have the best product portfolio, then you can go spend your life trying to sell it to all the customers out there. If I’d focused on channel and we didn’t have the products we have today, we’d be having a different conversation. You’d be asking me how I am going to compete on firewalls with Check Point and Fortinet and Cisco. 

Palo Alto Networks Chairman and CEO Nikesh Arora discusses his 2023 strategy, his long-term vision and why partners are the key to delivering transformation to the cybersecurity titan’s customers.

CEO Outlook 2023

If the past couple of years have taught the IT industry anything, it’s that businesses need faster returns on their IT investments and flexibility in the form of cloud-first offerings and Capex-based consumption models.

For many vendors, Everything as a Service is the name of the game for 2023. Cisco Systems Chair and CEO Chuck Robbins pledged that the networking giant will continue to accelerate its as-a-service offerings and partner managed services, which Robbins called a $113 billion opportunity for Cisco by 2025.

Meanwhile, Hewlett Packard Enterprise has made good on its 2019 promise to deliver the company’s entire portfolio as a service by 2022. Now, the company is continuing its mission this year with the help of its channel partners.

“Our goal is to give our partners the tools and flexibility to deliver modern cloud services in different ways, depending on where they and our shared customers are in their digital transformation

journeys,” said HPE President and CEO Antonio Neri.

But in a time of constant change and architectural shifts—whether it’s grappling with brand-new deployment models or geographically distributed employees—one thing remains certain: Security is at the forefront of everything these companies are doing.

Arista Networks CEO Jayshree Ullal called out security attacks and the ability to truly deploy networks and edge as a service as some of the biggest challenges facing the enterprise today.

“Customers are going to be challenged on whether to add to, refresh or completely redesign their networking capabilities, but we are excited to address the client-to-cloud network experience,” she said.

Here is where some of the leading technology CEOs are placing their bets in 2023 and how the channel will tackle emerging opportunities along with them.—By

Scan here for all of our CEO responses

What is the biggest market opportunity you and your channel partners will tackle together in 2023?

The biggest opportunity F5 and our partners have is to take something that is dauntingly complex—managing and securing apps—and make it ridiculously easy. We believe that applications are the most valuable asset of the modern digital enterprise. Applications and APIs are essential building blocks for new and better digital experiences that improve customer and employee engagement, streamline back-end operations and drive differentiation. ... There is tremendous opportunity this year for our partners to combine their services with F5’s growing portfolio of application security solutions to deliver impact for our joint customers.

Chair, President, CEO, AMD

Amidst the current macroeconomic environment, we are relentlessly focused on how AMD and our partners deliver the most value for our customers. Using our latest EPYC processors, businesses can significantly increase the computing capacity and overall performance of their data centers, while lowering their operating costs and reducing their energy usage and carbon footprint. Using PCs powered by our Ryzen CPUs, customers can ensure their employees have the tools they need to collaborate anytime and anywhere without worrying about battery life.

Together with our partners we are changing the ways businesses are communicating and collaborating and, as a result, we are improving customer and employee experiences. In the last two years, we doubled our channel contributions and have set the bold and ambitious goal of doing so yet again for the next two years. With our partners, we provide a leading and complete platform for communication and collaboration, reaching further and serving even more customers across different segments and geographies. Together, we can deliver more happiness and accomplish more than we can do alone.

Hybrid cloud and AI are the most powerful drivers of digital transformation for businesses today. Together they represent a $1 trillion market opportunity, and that is what we are tackling alongside our partners. Modernizing with hybrid cloud enables organizations with data located across multiple clouds, on-premises or at the edge to drive value across these different environments. It also offers compelling economics for both IBM and our ecosystem partners. ... In addition, we see tremendous opportunity in the channel around how enterprises can integrate artificial intelligence into their operations to improve sustainability efforts, narrow important skills gaps and enhance productivity.

Cybersecurity as a Service represents a massive opportunity for channel partners in 2023 and beyond. Today’s threat landscape is too difficult, too complex and changes too quickly for the vast majority of organizations to effectively manage cybersecurity on their own—and the hard truth is that most probably shouldn’t even try. ...

We have pivoted all of Sophos to embrace the opportunity of delivering CSaaS with industry-best MDR capabilities that partners can use to better defeat persistent, well-funded and organized attackers targeting their customers.

What are the key technology investments you plan to make in 2023?

Antonio Neri, President, CEO, Hewlett Packard Enterprise

In 2019, I committed to delivering HPE’s entire portfolio as a service by 2022. Last year, I am proud to say we delivered on that commitment, and HPE GreenLake has emerged as a leading hybrid cloud platform. In 2023 and beyond, we will continue to make key investments across our HPE GreenLake platform and portfolio of cloud services to extend our hybrid cloud leadership. Our innovation and pipeline of new HPE GreenLake offerings in 2023 is stacked across our entire product portfolio from compute, storage, supercomputing, AI, data analytics, private cloud enterprise and networking.

product

Fortinet will continue investing in longer-term innovation and go-to-market initiatives to fuel future growth, further validating our long-term commitment to customers and partners. For example, for over 20 years Fortinet has been a driving force in the evolution of cybersecurity and the convergence of networking and security. This leadership is the reason why Fortinet can help customers consolidate point products and features across both security and networking. Channel partners can offer their customers robust solutions based on an integrated cybersecurity platform that comprises a broad portfolio of solutions that are designed to work together.

Jim Kavanaugh, Co-Founder, CEO, World Wide Technology

We are very focused on investments in digital transformation and how we can help our customers deliver great user experiences, attract new clients and increase customer value. Our customers are investing in solutions like custom software development, data analytics, AI/ML and IoT to better inform decision-making and foster a more data-driven culture. This type of focus on digital transformation helps our customers adapt to market demands while seamlessly integrating data and insights into new policies and processes that enhance overall productivity and cybersecurity.

Christina Kosmowski, CEO, LogicMonitor

We will continue to invest in ways that empower our partners to compete and win in their markets, and that includes further enhancing our observability platform, LM Envision. With an intuitive interface, ecosystem of 2,000-plus integrations and agentless deployment, LM Envision offers fast time to value and return on investment. We have released hundreds of core and cloud expansions to allow monitoring more technologies for end customers, and we continue to improve our AIOps capabilities with robust alert filtering and analytics.

Rajiv Ramaswami, President, CEO, Nutanix

We know customer usage and adoption are key to our success along with our partners’ [success]. In order for our partners to drive customer success, we have to enable them with insights into how their customers are using and adopting our products in their organization. To do this, we plan to invest more resources into getting this data to our partners so they can have meaningful, data-driven interactions with their customers to drive more adoption, expansion opportunities and better success in landing renewals.

What do you see as the toughest challenges facing customers in 2023?

Continued economic uncertainty in 2023 is forcing organizations to be as cost-conscious as ever, and our challenge is to help our clients make high-value decisions amid the uncertainty. But this is also an incredible opportunity for everyone to get wiser about how they use their resources, where modern technology like automation can open the door to greater agility and new insights about the business. ... Being a trusted partner means that we can meet clients where they are to help them get to where they want to be—from IT strategy and design to implementation, organizational change and day-to-day management.

Gee Rittenhouse, CEO, Skyhigh Security

The toughest challenge we see is securing a modern enterprise in an environment where data and users are everywhere. Many clients struggle just being able to identify where their data is, who has access to it, who is supposed to have access to it and when they should have access to it. These are tough challenges for our clients. This is particularly true in an environment where they are short-staffed and access to talent is still a struggle. In addition, CISOs now find themselves with increased board oversight. As a result, they are looking to work with trusted partners and a reduced ecosystem to simplify wherever they can.

Dan Schwab, Co-President, D&H Distributing

Customer experience will require additional channel transformation and will pose challenges, especially for VARs and MSPs that serve the SMB and midmarket sectors. CX and life-cycle management is critical for customer retention, driving consumption and renewals as the market moves to as-a-service models. Many vendors are requiring certifications and investments in this area. D&H is investing in Customer Success Specialists to help partners execute CX responsibilities and evolving automated resources such as the D&H Cloud Marketplace and Cisco Partner Enablement platforms with business intelligence data to make the process easier.

to investing

Gajen Kandiah, CEO, Hitachi Vantara

Technology leaders are challenged with how to manage data across an ever-changing infrastructure landscape and, for many, the enterprise data center is in a bit of a crisis. An explosion of unstructured data, a ‘reconciliation’ from cloud to on-premises, hybrid cloud, multi-cloud and so on has placed cost, complexity and flexibility squarely at the top of customers’ concerns. ... By fostering an ecosystem of collaboration and leveraging the full weight of Hitachi’s industrial expertise, we’re enabling our partners to provide trusted solutions and unmatched reliability to any customer, regardless of size or industry.

Globally, we continue to see macroeconomic headwinds and economic uncertainty. ... Semiconductor manufacturing that is too concentrated in any one region can cause rapid and extraordinary disruption like we saw during the pandemic. ... Even as we all continue to face these global challenges, semiconductors remain as critical as ever to power essential technologies. With everything going more digital, we believe the long-term demand for semiconductors will continue to grow. This is why Intel continues to focus on navigating the challenges of today while still investing for the needs of tomorrow.

What is the key to success for your channel partners in 2023?

Chuck Robbins, Chair, CEO, Cisco Systems

The complexity produced by our industry continues to grow without bound, and our partners are struggling to keep up with that craziness. As such, I believe the key for success of our channel partners is to continue working closely with us as we simplify the cloud edge and data protection. We’ll continue to simplify the buying motion, the training engagement and other operational tasks. Partners can become successful by just caring about solving our customers’ biggest problems and not worrying about complicated processes and tools. processes

Yang Yuanqing, Chair, CEO, Lenovo

The key success factor is to grow, learn and transform together in a changing world. Today, many small and medium businesses and large enterprises are moving toward the Everything-as-a-Service consumption model, and Lenovo has built our solutions and services business into a new growth engine. We will work with our channel partners and seize these opportunities together. In the past few years, the industry has faced many uncertainties such as manufacturing disruptions, supply risks and the global pandemic, and some of them are likely to persist for a while. So we will continue to help our channel partners and navigate through these challenges together. navigate

Raghu Raghuram, CEO, VMware

Customer success in multi-cloud depends on a connected ecosystem. Neither VMware nor any single partner can solve all of a customer’s needs alone. Through our interconnected and diverse global partner ecosystem, we enable more partner-to-partner collaboration to help customers to become ‘cloud smart’ and achieve outcomes faster. ... Partners focusing on business outcomes, such as accelerating app modernization, enabling enterprise cloud transformation and securing the hybrid workforce, will be best positioned for success.

Jayshree Ullal, President, CEO, Arista Networks

Arista has been rapidly expanding into the campus as a natural adjacent selling opportunity. With businesses changing rapidly, as evidenced by new hybrid work environments and distributed enterprises to support them, channel partners have a complete Arista solutions portfolio to address these evolving needs. This shift, along with the transition to data-driven cloud networking, is driving the need for technology refreshes that can support these changing needs. Channel partners can now leverage innovations from Arista to introduce anti-legacy technologies that truly address 21st century data-driven networking requirements.

Eugene Kaspersky, CEO, Kaspersky

We can see that more and more MSPs are looking to diversify their offerings and to generate more revenue streams from each individual customer without necessarily having to invest more in people or expertise. This means that MSPs will rely even more on vendor services. Also, the inability of many MSPs to build their own SOC provides great opportunities to sell or upsell Kaspersky’s managed security services into their existing install base. We also continue to accommodate more advanced security needs to larger MSPs and MSSPs by making more products available through our subscription price list.

Fill in the blank: My top priority for 2023 is _____________.

Technology has never been more central to the world, and we are at the center of the technology ecosystem. It is exhilarating. In 2023, I want to drive even more progress for our partners, our customers and our world, enabling more positive change than ever before.

George Kurtz, , Co-Founder, CEO, CrowdStrike

The CrowdStrike ecosystem. That’s our partners. It’s our customers. And it’s our people. We’re going to keep delivering and innovating the world’s premier cybersecurity platform. We’re approaching the market in new ways in 2023. We just brought on Daniel Bernard as our Chief Business Officer, who leads our partnering organization. He’ll be working with our worldwide alliances team to evolve CrowdStrike’s channel program. ... This change allows CrowdStrike and our teams to focus on the channel in new ways and double down on winning together.

Building on our success from 2022 and the continued expansion of our cloud offerings, we will continue to focus on expanding services and consumption models such as managed services, workplace transformation, security and cloud services. In addition, our goal year after year is to empower our employees and maintain a high level of customer satisfaction, meeting or exceeding our existing rating of 98 percent.

Rami Rahim, CEO, Juniper Networks

The past few years have been about transforming our identity as a company, shifting our heritage of hardware to software, infusing more AI and automation throughout our portfolio and continuing to leverage our significant footprint in the service provider and cloud provider segments to fuel our enterprise growth. This foundation ... now means we’ve given ourselves a license to invest in Juniper to scale and truly achieve the vision we’ve staked out: to be the leader in AI-driven, secure and cloud-delivered networking. Our channel partners play a significant role in achieving this, and we can’t scale without the formidable army of partners. So in 2023 expect to see us continue investing in our channel program with more incentives and more programming.

Partnering closely with NetApp customers and partners to help them leverage the power of data and the cloud to transform their businesses. ... When cloud is fully integrated into your architecture and operations, and not just another walled garden, it has the potential to live up to its full promise. Moving data, migrating and deploying applications also become remarkably easy when your storage foundation is the same on-prem and across every cloud. With this approach, applications can pull data effortlessly from multiple clouds, data can move freely, securely and with consistency between clouds to keep business logic moving forward, and businesses can quickly adapt to deliver on the outcomes they need to for their customers.

Leveraging e Channel’s Wealth Of Talent

The IT industry and the channel entered 2023 with perhaps the greatest economic uncertainty in decades, creating more challenges for channel executives and the partner programs they develop and manage.

“Partners are choosing their line cards very carefully,” said Frank Rauch, global channel chief at Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel-based Cato Networks. “The economy is probably not where we need it to be, and this is a time of choice for some channel partners even though they may be very, very comfortable with some of the vendors on their line card right now.”

As it does each year, CRN has assembled the 2023 Channel Chiefs, a list of the pre-eminent channel executives in the IT industry. Within the list are the 50 Most Influential Channel Chiefs of 2023, an elite group drawn from the larger pool of honorees who drive the channel agenda and evangelize the importance of partnerships. The 50 Most Influential Channel Chiefs are recognized on the following pages with a star.

At Palo Alto, Calif.-based VMware, the 2023 channel strategy has two prongs: One is to get solution providers to take on higher-level services and the second is to drive more opportunities to partners, said Ricky Cooper, head of worldwide partner and commercial sales. That includes VMware’s new Partner Connect 2.0 program, slated to launch in the first quarter, that will place more emphasis on partners becoming technically proficient, offering systems integrators points for services as well as test and development work.

“We will make a huge effort to ensure that we’re passing as many services opportunities as we can to our partner ecosystem, and you’ll see a huge change there,” Cooper said. “Things are really opening up [for partners].”

11:11 Systems

Koorosh Khashayar

VP, Global Channel Khashayar merged the channel programs of four companies acquired by 11:11 Systems. From legal contracts to compensation structures to new product announcements, he unified every detail of the programs and on-boarded partners.

8x8

Lisa Del Real

Global Channel Chief

Del Real completed her first full year leading the 8x8 global channel program, launching the new 8x8 Elevate Partner Program and the benefits available to tiered partners. She is continuing to build the partner support team.

There is sometimes a knee-jerk tendency to pull back from channel investments in uncertain economic times, but “smart” vendors leverage the channel’s wealth of talent, said Scott Winslow, founder and president of Winslow Technology Group, Waltham, Mass.

“We have sales, engineering, marketing, finance services, managed services folks that we are employing on our payroll that are available to our [vendor] partners. What better way for them to become more efficient themselves than to do more with a channel?” Winslow said.

Also looking to win more partner mindshare is Seattle-based Amazon Web Services. The company is forming strategic collaboration agreements (SCAs) with more partners, laying out its commitment to train and pass along customer opportunities to partners if they agree to invest in areas such as hiring AWS professionals, growing their AWS portfolio offerings and winning new customers.

Innovative Solutions, Rochester, N.Y., recently signed an SCA through which AWS is investing to help it build new sales teams that are business-outcome-oriented versus transactional, quickly train and certify new hires, and offer dedicated AWS salespeople to work hand-in-hand with the solution provider.

“AWS wants us to help drive 1,000 net-new AWS SMB customers over the next four years, which is a huge lift that we wouldn’t be able to do without them,” said Justin Copie, Innovative Solutions CEO. “As part of the SCA, we’ll hire 200 new people. … Even in this economy, we’re hiring—not firing.

“They need armies of partners that are aligned to the core values of AWS,” Copie said. “They’re really looking to see where their most strategic partners can lead customer journeys instead of AWS leading those journeys. The opportunity is just so massive.”

Abnormal Security

Bertrand Yansouni VP, Worldwide Channels

S ince joining Abnormal Security in early 2022, Yansouni has built the channel sales organization by attracting strong talent. He has grown the team 4X since the start of 2022 and continues to recruit and hire for key positions.

Accedian

Kevin Baranowski

Sr. Director, Global Channels

Baranowski launched the MSP Advantage methodology that combines business consulting, product line management and sales enablement to identify, guide and execute new services for the company’s MSP and MSSP partners.

Accedian

Sergio Bea VP, Global Enterprise, Channel Sales Bea funded and led the initiative to implement a disruptive Digital Sales Enablement offering that partners can leverage to map and enhance the buyer’s journey. He also built new enablement tracks for partners.

Acer

Philip Burger

VP, U.S. Channel

Burg er’s team collaborated to build an education road map this past year centered around premium, higher-spec devices, which was a winning strategy. The team embraced new technologies and educated the partner base on new service offerings.

Addigy

Jason Dettbarn

Founder, CEO

Dettbarn has been hard at work educating partners on the Apple device management opportunity. He launched an integration with Malwarebytes whereby partners can deploy Malwarebytes OneView directly from the Addigy portal.

Alegeus

Karen Thomas Chief Growth Officer

Thomas led efforts to achieve a partnerfirst focus at Alegeus. By aligning to partner objectives in providing customers with the best benefit options, the company and its partners are collectively creating operating leverage.

Amazon Web Services

Pratt Dey Director, Strategic Partner Collaboration, Governance

With a sharp focus on partner transformation, Dey achieved a pivotal AWS sales and marketing goal by signing multiyear strategic collaboration agreements across five key industry verticals.

Acer

Jennifer Wadland VP, U.S. Commercial Sales Wadland works with channel partners to grow Acer’s education and commercial business, focused on call center, kiosk and health-care verticals. Partners have seen strong revenue and market-share growth in these areas.

Adlumin

Jim Adams CRO Adams created a tiered channel program that rewards partners for their investment and success with Adlumin. Included in the program was the launch of a quarterly rebate and quarterly MDF funding based on their sales.

Alludo

Jaime Becker Sr. Global Director, Partner Experience

Becker built her team around a clear focus: making it simpler for partners to empower their customers and grow their business with Alludo products. She recently spearheaded the launch of the Parallels Partner Program.

Amazon Web Services

Chris Grusz GM, ISV Alliances, Marketplace

Previously, AWS Marketplace was seen as a tool to automate channel business, but Grusz has spent time meeting with channel teams at some of AWS’ top ISV partners to go beyond that and actually grow their business.

Acronis

Alex Ruslyakov

Channel Chief

Ruslyakov is laserfocused on making sure that Acronis is more partner-driven by improving channel programs. More workloads means smarter AI and better protection so as the number of partners increases, so does the effectiveness of Acronis’ products.

Adlumin

Chris Joe VP, Channels, Distribution Joe launched a comprehensive MSP program, leveraging Adlumin’s purpose-built platform to assist partners in building out or expanding their cybersecurity practice. He also developed a distribution strategy, inking a partnership with Ingram Micro.

Alteryx

Barb Huelskamp SVP, Global Partners, Alliances

Huelskamp updated Alteryx’s partner program to provide more benefits to growing partners. She also created a go-to-market structure focused on the partner type, leading to year-over-year growth in partner revenue.

Amazon Web Services

Jeff Kratz GM, Worldwide Public Sector Partners Kratz’s team has launched Solution Spark, which helps partners build tools; Smart City Competency, which helps partners market solutions; and six Accelerators, which help startups learn to sell to public sector customers.

Act

Lindsay Boullin VP, GM, International Boullin embraced the launch of a new ACT product line and grew top-line performance year over year. He also transferred an add-on marketplace from a partner to Act corporate, enabling the expansion of the company’s ecosystem.

Advantix

Natasha Royer Coons CRO

Royer Coons rolled out a new partner enablement strategy that has been replicated and scaled across an extensive portfolio of partners but especially solution providers moving into wireless connectivity solutions.

Acumatica

CJ Boguszewski

VP, Partner Programs, Strategy

Acumatica has developed its Services Partner Program with the leadership of Boguszewski. He has also reduced pre-existing capacity issues, offered business referrals and restructured the partner margin program to make it easier to navigate.

AireSpring

John Young SVP, Channel Sales

Young has doubled the channel team with a focus on integrity and relationships and introduced several new growth roles into AireSpring’s channel. Young is in the field every week working with partners and channel managers toward collective success.

Amazon Web Services

Ruba Borno VP, Worldwide Channels, Alliances

In her first year at AWS, Borno has pursued hundreds of thousands of opportunities with partners. She also has met with over 1,000 partners and customers across geographies, sizes and industries to understand their needs.

Amazon Web Services

Rachel Mushahwar Managing Director, Head of Channel, Partner Sales, N.A.

Mushahwar led a global transformation of the Partner Success organization into Partner Sales to reflect a new responsibility for driving net-new revenue. This evolution positioned Partner Sales as the scaling engine for AWS.

Amazon Web Services

Julia Chen VP, Partner Core

Chen joined AWS in June 2022 and is now defining the company’s global partner strategy and scaling mechanisms to achieve the goal of delivering a more simple, predictable and profitable experience for partners.

Amazon Web Services

Chris Sullivan GM, Global Systems Integrators

Sullivan dramatically increased the company’s focus and investment in distribution partners, resulting in accelerated business volumes and increased capabilities for partners and customers.

Amazon Web Services

Sachin Vora

In June 2022 Vora took on a broader role leading all AWS Partner Network programs, with the charter of simplifying the programs by aligning them to partner journey stages.

AOM/ZPI

Darrel Letcher

President, CEO

With the company’s distribution partners, Letcher spearheaded an initiative to expand a channel-exclusive endpoint device warranty offering. He also garnered support from distribution to grow its focus on diversity spending.

Arctic Wolf

Will Briggs

SVP, Global Channels

Briggs invested in topperforming channel partners while outlining a clear path for partners of all sizes to grow. He is focused on helping partners build out services-based, strategic engagement models that will provide them with recurring revenue streams.

Arrow Electronics

Danielle Post Global VP, Marketing, Customer Experience

Post has overseen strong progress in the global brand awareness of Arrow’s enterprise computing solutions business. She also has increased the emphasis on annual integrated business planning.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Amazon Web Services

Matt Yanchyshyn

GM, AWS Marketplace, Partner Engineering Yanchyshyn joined AWS in 2012 when cloud computing was just a glimmer in most CIOs’ eyes. He has led multiple AWS service teams and technical sales organizations and now leads all engineering for AWS’ partner organization.

AppDirect

Renée Bergeron COO

Bergeron completed the acquisition of IT Cloud, expanding the footprint of AppDirect’s adviser business in Canada. She also led the unification of all operations to support advisers, providers and business customers.

Arctic Wolf

Bob Skelley VP, Channel Strategy, Development

Skelley helped develop new channel communities in the cybersecurity insurance and incident response arenas. He also worked with the channel community and product group to launch new channel services for partners.

Arrow Electronics

Dana Zaba

Supplier Management Director

Zaba drove growth in strategic focus areas such as hybrid cloud, public sector, flash storage and software. She also operationalized the distribution process for IBM software transactions through the AWS Marketplace and partners.

AMD

Marty Bauerlein

Head of North American VAR Channel, Commercial Distribution

Bauerlein implemented a robust channel program and enhanced AMD’s field coverage model with a 75 percent increase in channel head count. He also created a CIO Advisory Council to keep customers at the center of everything.

Appfire

Colin Puckett SVP, Global Channel, Field Operations With no direct sales team, the channel program is Appfire’s primary path to market. Under Puckett’s leadership, the purposebuilt program has been successful and enables partners’ business to see growth as well.

Armis

Tim Mackie VP, Worldwide Channels

Mackie launched the Armis Partner Experience program and APEX Manage track. He also instilled a “channel-first” philosophy within Armis and oversaw the development of operational visibility into the business.

Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company

Donna Grothjan

VP, Worldwide Channels Grothjan led Aruba’s efforts transforming the partner base to enable the delivery of XaaS/NaaS offerings. She has transformed all aspects of the partner operating model, from partner goto-market strategy to all aspects of partner enablement and sales capabilities.

AMD

Terry Richardson

North America

Channel Chief Richardson has made AMD a channel force to be reckoned with through his focus on a “land and expand” strategy that delivers business outcomes. This has resulted in 100 percent sales-out growth in data center servers.

Aqua Security

Jeannette Lee Heung

Sr. Director, Global Channel, Ecosystems Lee Heung created and launched a new global partner program, streamlined strategic partners, increased value to the sales team from the channel and launched a global partner promotion— all leading to an increase in channel revenue.

Arrow Electronics

Andy Banks VP, Supplier Alliances, North America Banks leads a team of supplier managers and engineers who support all existing and new supplier lines and alliances. Under his direction, the team of channel professionals overachieved their targets year to date.

Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company

Jim Harold VP, North American Channels Harold implemented a highertouch, more focused model by improving the CAM-to-partner ratio and making CAMs more accountable for partner growth. This allows them to concentrate on fewer partners and customize partner plans.

Anomali

Chris

Peterson has reinvented Anomali’s partner model from the ground up. He has embraced a channel-first strategy, rolled out an allnew margin-based partner program and expanded the channel-dedicated field team.

Arcserve

Denise Parker

EVP, Global Sales

Parker leads Arcserve’s global sales and teams and go-to-market initiatives, providing customers with a unified data protection and management platform to ensure data resilience everywhere and every time.

Arrow Electronics

Tamara Ells VP, GM, U.S. Public Sector

Ells has increased the number of field representatives and sales support personnel in her first six months on the job. This focus allows Arrow to support channel partners more effectively and tighten operational SLAs.

Aryaka Networks

Craig Patterson

SVP, Global Channels

Patterson launched the Aryaka Accelerate Global Partner Program. He also restructured staffing channel sales, marketing and support by region and partner model and created an elite partner tier with access to account-based marketing and sales.

Why Watch?

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Katiyar is defining the kind of channel partnerships to pursue, given the stage of Asimily’s growth. He is creating collateral for channel sales enablement, building key relationships with channel executives and setting business values for both sides.

Atlassian

Ko Mistry

Head of Global Channels

Mistry saw the need to further align with the greater Atlassian sales team and accomplished this through compensation neutrality and rewarding sales members for introducing partners to new and existing customer opportunities.

Avant

Jen Gallego EVP, Global Sales Gallego built a highperformance sales team, removing barriers and stepping out of the way so the team could thrive. As a result, Avant has a close alignment of the entire organization in terms of mission, vision and goals.

Axis Security

Nicholas Mirizzi

Head of Global Channels, Alliances

Mirizzi identified key target partners and then onboarded them, enabling Axis to ramp up sales quickly. He simplified programs and delivered call-to-action promotions and spiffs that significantly increased pipeline and strengthened close rates.

AT&T

Rick Chapes

Associate VP, Partner Exchange Chapes has helped to educate over 1,000 solution providers and their key channel representatives on how to adopt a solutionsbased approach to selling versus a product approach. This helped increase their revenue growth rates.

ATSG

Warren Greenberg

Chief Client Officer Greenberg worked to drive thought leadership and his channel philosophy into the ATSG organization. He has built partner programs and engagement that create value for partners and drive optimal business outcomes.

Avaya

John Lindsley VP, North American Channel Sales Lindsley focused Avaya’s CAMs on business development, planning and partner enablement. He consolidated the traditional channel and cloud channel into one integrated team to improve partner coverage across all Avaya platforms.

Axonius

Mark Daggett VP, Worldwide Channels, Alliances Daggett led the Axonius channel program to explosive growth over the past two years, including more than doubling the number of partners. With his guidance, the program now has leadership and program support in every major region worldwide.

AT&T

Christopher Jones

Associate VP, Alliance Channel, ACC Business

Jones implemented a partner expansion and participation focus within his organization. He reinforces that the organization needs to be responsive and easy to do business with.

Augmentt

Ali Mahmoud VP, Product, Partner Success

Mahmoud revamped Augmentt’s on-boarding process to accelerate partner time to value. He also deployed analytics software to gain visibility into partner adoption of the company’s software and programs.

AvePoint

Heather Murray Chief Channel Officer

In her first few months at AvePoint, Murray made it a priority to listen to every contributor on the channel team to get an understanding of their opportunities and challenges. That helped identify areas for improvement for fiscal year 2023 planning.

AT&T

Randall Porter

VP, Partner Solutions

Porter is focused on creating a best-in-class partner program by zeroing in on increasing enablement and bringing more data-driven tools to help partners serve their customers better.

Avalara

Sona Akmakjian

Global Head of Strategic Accounting Partnerships

Akmakjian drove the launch of Avalara for Accountants, through which partners can now utilize Avalara technology in their company and get certified to implement Avalara for customers, in addition to referrals.

Aveva

Steve Lewarne VP, Global Channel Programs

Lewarne was integral in accelerating the transition of the channel business to a recurring revenue model with enablement, commercial and incentive programs. He led the integration of the OSISoft acquisition into the channel partner program.

Barracuda

Neal Bradbury

SVP, MSP Business

Bradbury’s understanding of MSPs’ business model and commitment to addressing their evolving needs is contagious. This translates into an organizationwide focus on prioritization of customer experience and enablement.

AT&T

Sarita Rao

President, Integrated, Partner Solutions

Rao is bringing all of AT&T’s goto-market sales efforts with partners together in one organization, including wholesale, resale, co-sell and offers with hyperscalers. This has created synergies to enable better partner engagement.

Avalara

Frank Hanzlik VP, GM, Global Strategic Partner Development

Hanzlik reorganized Avalara’s partner development team, segmenting partners by tiers. For strategic partners he developed a cross-functional team approach, providing whiteglove service and creating new strategies for mid- and lower-tier partners.

Aveva

Joy Verplank VP, Americas Partners

Verplank reviewed the partner program with a fresh perspective while sharing ideas to grow the business. She acts as a voice for partners and places great importance on establishing relationships to drive strategic alignment around initiatives and goals.

Barracuda Networks

Chris Ross

CRO

Ross drove a channelfirst focus across all areas of the business. He is expanding channel resources, especially in North America, to ensure more support for partners and is building a global channel leadership structure to bring together best practices.

BCM One

Andrew Steinke VP, Channel Sales

Steinke navigated the merging of channel teams resulting from BCM One’s growth via acquisition. Emerging from the pandemic year, he oversaw a 20-plus percent increase in partner activity and maintains production for his channel team at 100 percent of plan to date.

Bitdefender

Bruce Johnson

Sr. Director, North America

Channels

Johnson helped redefine the economic structure of Bitdefender’s partnerships. He also doubled the size of the channel team, reinvigorated the deal registration program and launched a master class training progarm for partners.

Blokworx

Robert Boles

CEO

Boles has created clear lanes of organizational accountability at Blokworx while doubling head count. He has been an MSSP for 23 years and has been evangelizing the company to new communities.

Broadcom Software

Cynthia Loyd

VP, Global Enterprise, Commercial, Partner Sales

Loyd has turned the distribution model upside down with Broadcom’s Cybersecurity Aggregator program. The program has the potential to transform the margin profile and increase profitability.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

BeyondTrust

Rob Spee SVP, Global Channels, Alliances Spee’s goal in joining BeyondTrust

a year ago was to develop and gain alignment on a partner ecosystem strategy. He has since built a team of 45 members, including experts in channels, alliances, global partners and partner programs.

Bitdefender

Samantha Sisk North American Distribution Manager

Sisk serves as a distribution manager to execute Bitdefender’s 100 percent channel-focused strategy. She strives to simplify security sales while ensuring continued growth.

BlueVoyant

Craig Hurley Head of Channels

Hurley has focused on creating a culture at BlueVoyant that puts the needs of channel partners and their end customers first. His goal is to solve problems for end customers and enable partners for success.

Broadcom Software

Laura McGregor Falko Head of Worldwide Partner Programs, Experience, Marketing

McGregor Falko was integral to the Cybersecurity Aggregator program, which is redefining the role of the distributor, and the Expert Advantage program, which is reinventing traditional professional services and support models.

BigPanda

Joe Schramm VP, Channel, Alliances

Schramm developed a partner strategy and vision, defining a baseline for where BigPanda is today and where it wants to be two years from now. The company ended 2022 with its highest level of engagement in training and enablement offerings.

BitTitan

Lon Clark Director, Global Channel Sales

Clark oversaw the launch of BitTitan’s learning management system for distributors and partners, which lets them access information and training at any time. The system is a primary vehicle for delivering support.

Britive

Jason Turner Director, Channel Sales Turner developed a channel program and executive alignment across the offices of the CEO, CRO and CMO. He also hired an early stage channel team and created the ideal partner profile, recruiting the first class of Britive partners.

bvoip

George Bardissi

Founder, CEO

Bardissi has to wear a lot of hats at bvoip. He steps in and takes care of gaps when his team needs it, helps partners position and close deals with their downstream end customers, and builds out new enablement resources.

Binary Defense

Sharon Baechtle VP, Channel Sales

Binary Defense’s executive leadership team brings transformation in sales, marketing, technical, delivery and customer support. In this strategy there is a significant investment into the partner program, and Baechtle’s role is to take a fresh look at that program.

Blackpoint Cyber

Christine Gassman Director, Channel Engagement

Gassman revamped the MDF process to provide funding to MSP partners and is also delivering marketing support, best practices for successful event and campaign execution, and post-activity sales plans.

Broadcom Software

Roy Borden VP, Global Partner Distribution, Reseller Sales Borden has focused on partner programming in two areas: customer adoption and serving the SMB base. Broadcom’s Cybersecurity Aggregator program and Expert Advantage services programs have transformed how the channel operates.

bvoip

Alec Stanners

VP, Business Development

Stanners led the way as bvoip over the past year had its biggest new business sales year. This was accomplished through a mix of joining new communities and teaming up with existing partners to show the channel what bvoip offers.

BIO-key International

Fred Corsentino CRO

Corsentino on-boarded three of the largest distributors as additions to the channel program. He has focused sales and marketing teams to be partner-centric and is making it easy for partners to identify opportunities and work with a dedicated BIOkey team to win.

Blackpoint Cyber

Cody Staley VP, Sales, Marketing

Staley restructured the sales process to best support the MSP sales journey for new and existing partners. The shift in how Blackpoint Cyber approaches sales now focuses on oneon-one relationships with MSPs and their customers.

Broadcom Software

Michael Durkin CTO, Partners Durkin’s role in Broadcom’s Aggregator program involved putting the strategic technical plan and enablement certifications in place. Meanwhile, for the Expert Advantage services program, he was the professional services subject-matter expert.

Calero-MDSL

Jason Wieser Global VP, Channels

Wieser streamlined CaleroMDSL’s contracting methodologies, invested in talent, completely revamped the channel program and launched unique marketing programs designed to help partners build their funnel.

CallTower

Seanna

Sr.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Canonical

Carahsoft

Carahsoft

Carahsoft

CallTower’s strong marketing apparatus is due to the efforts of Baumgartner. Every sale that CallTower achieves is because of the vision she captured and the well-curated and managed creative teams she oversees.

Carahsoft

Brian O’Donnell VP

O’Donnell’s team saw 35 percent revenue growth year over year. To help support and match his team’s growth, he has recruited over 50 team members, a number that is likely to continue growing as Carahsoft’s channel involvement broadens.

CharTec

Brandi Rogers

Marketing Director

Rogers is steering CharTec’s marketing efforts with an outside-the-box approach, resulting in growth for the company. She has helped countless MSPs to increase their business.

Cirrus Data Solutions

Ron Croce CRO, EVP, Worldwide Sales, Marketing

Croce refocused global sales on the power of building one-on-one relationships with channel partners. The launch of partner events created stronger bonds between the channel and Cirrus Data.

Regis Paquette SVP, Global Alliances, Channels, Industry Verticals Paquette put in place a structure that can scale with Canonical’s sales organization this year. The channel has been the biggest growth engine of all of the company’s partner organizations for the first time.

Carahsoft

Mike Shrader VP, Intelligence, Innovative Solutions

Shrader is charged with helping to bring innovative solutions for the intelligence sector to market, and in the past year Carahsoft on-boarded more than 50 new technology companies and grew revenue by more than $500 million.

Checkmarx

Anthony Adebanjo Sr. Director, Channel Programs

Adebanjo ensured that the company’s partner programs became directly relevant to partners and provided extensive enablement support via the Partner Academy portal.

Cirrus Data Solutions

Mark Greenlaw VP, Global Marketing Strategy, North American Sales Under Greenlaw’s leadership, the company deepened its relationships with channel partners. He added multiple new important partners and re-emphasized key strategic partners including WWT, Presidio and Corus360.

Terry

The business unit Drinkwine oversees grew by more than $500 million last year, much of that attributable to channel growth and the increased adoption of cloud and security solutions by public sector customers.

Carahsoft

Cortney Steiner VP, Sales

Steiner has worked to support small and disadvantaged businesses, which is critical to the public sector. Her initiatives to on-board and enable small businesses over the past year has resulted in millions of dollars in sales.

Ciena

Matt Cook VP, Global Partners

Cook launched the next evolution of Ciena’s partner program, the CPN ecosystem. It was a massive initiative that enables the company to put partners at the center of everything it does.

Cisco AppDynamics

Mark Maslach VP, Global Channels, Strategic Alliances

Maslach updated the AppDynamics Global Partner Program, resulting in increased partner profitability. A 100 percent channel sales model gave partners confidence in the company’s channel commitment.

Maryam Emdadi VP,

In 2022 Carahsoft launched a distribution partnership with Palantir, which previously sold exclusively via a direct model. Emdadi was instrumental in creating this channel program, helping to productize Palantir’s key offerings that would be sold through the channel.

Cato Networks

Frank Rauch Global Channel

New to Cato, Rauch’s responsibilities include strategy, execution and results for partners around the globe. His plans are to focus on managed services, technology solution brokers, worldwide partner recruitment, and program and operations improvements.

Ciena

Linda Hutchinson

Global Partner Leader, Solution Provider Business Development, CPN Program, Operations Hutchinson redefined indirect regional goto-market initiatives and improved Ciena’s field sales partnering muscle. Both are critical success factors for accelerating channel growth.

Cisco Systems

Jason Gallo VP, Global Partner Go To Market Acceleration

Gallo accelerated partner goto-market by strengthening Cisco’s networking and cloud foundation, delivering software choice and moving the onpremises portfolio to cloud-managed.

Natalie Gregory VP

Gregory leads Carahsoft’s opensource business unit, which is anchored by Red Hat. For the past decade, she has worked to educate and spread the adoption of open-source technology throughout the public sector.

CharTec

Nick Points Director, Sales

Points has worked with, coached and mentored more than 200 MSPs to solve the problems that traditional sales approaches create for them in the channel. This proven sales process and strategies have yielded millions of dollars in managed services revenue for MSPs.

Ciena

Patricia Picco Channel Partner Ecosystem Program Leader

Picco led an evolution of Ciena’s partner program. She moved to one level of partnership, which creates the means for a connected ecosystem where partners collaborate to deliver integrated solutions.

Cisco Systems

Rhonda Henley VP, Americas Partner Organization

Henley is focused on predictability and profitability for partners. Guided by the partner playbook, she met customers where they were and delivered solutions that drove value, which led to new opportunities.

Channel Chief View

Delivering The New Logic Of Work

Q.With the marketplace ever-evolving, how can partners experience success in 2023?

Crystal: We are at a transformational point where companies and partners must redefine what work looks like. It is now a hybrid working reality. There’s a shift in the needs of customers, with a focus on hybrid work and how they can be more efficient and productive while retaining their skilled workforce. Partners must lean into ingenuity, inclusivity and flexibility to enable agility, optimize performance, invest in their employees and leverage creative ways to get in front of their customers with best of breed solutions, financing and quick deployment.

Q.How does Logitech deliver for all people and all spaces?

Anthony: For enterprises, we help businesses pursue a new way of working by designing experiences so all people can create and collaborate effectively from anywhere. For all people, our solutions solve for diverse needs and environments and support productivity anywhere with customizable keyboards, mice, headsets and webcams. In all spaces, we help drive better collaboration, support equity and build culture at home, in the office, and in between with intuitive video conferencing tools. For all business, we provide the tools and support you need for device management, security and deployment, whether you’re a small business or large enterprise.

Q.Where do you envision channel partner investment is headed in today’s market?

Crystal: With the changes in the buyer’s journey, it is important that our partners invest in the online customer experience and an e-commerce platform where they can truly elevate and curate quality content-which include tools that help their customers easily navigate along and select the “right” choices on technology, showcase additional products to attach and highlight their value-added services. It will also be important that partners invest in sustainability initiatives and continue to improve their team’s consultancy and technical capabilities.

Q.How important is the partner community for your business?

Anthony: Our partner community is the cornerstone of our strategy. We are committed to providing our partners with the highest level of support to develop, market, sell and deliver innovative, industry-leading personal and team workplace and collaboration solutions that solve the business needs of our mutual customers.

” We place the partner experience at the core of our efforts, and through the New Logic of Work, our partners can lean in with customers and help them identify the best ways to redesign their workspaces to meet the needs of their people and help them succeed at hybrid work.

Cisco Systems

Kristyn Hogan

VP, Global Collaboration Partner Sales Hogan launched a Webex activation incentive and a premises-to-cloudcalling migration incentive. She also rolled out two routes for partners to simply and profitably transact collaboration.

Cisco Systems

Thimaya Subaiya

CXO/Chief Customer Experience Officer

Subaiya dedicates much of his time to listening to partners and integrating their feedback into Cisco’s customer experience (CX) strategy to help partners succeed. Under his leadership, the CX business has continued to help partners accelerate their journey.

Cisco Systems

Alexandra Zagury VP, Partner Managed, As-a-Service Sales

Zagury led the goto-market partner sales team to focus on enabling partner-led managed services and the transition to as a service. She also executed around a platform, preference and performance strategy.

Cloudflare

Steve Pataky Head of Sales, Cloudflare Area 1

Pataky helped design the new Cloudflare One Partner Program. This was a great opportunity to land key concepts and learnings in a new program that is recruiting, developing and ramping Cloudflare’s channel for zero trust solutions.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Cisco Systems

Nick Holden VP, Global Strategic Partners, Co-Sell Holden helped define Cisco’s new routes to market with cloud hyperscalers—and Cisco’s engagement model with hyperscalers and channel partners—to meet customers’ new buying needs.

Cisco Systems

Marc Surplus VP, Partner Strategy, Programs Surplus’ team drove partner differentiation through solution specializations, lower costs to achieve differentiation, more opportunities to earn incentives, and a better experience with tools and systems.

Cisco ThousandEyes

Craig Vario Head of Channel

Vario oversaw efforts that paved the way for ThousandEyes’ transition to go all in on channel sales. He also detailed best practices for driving more subscription-based annual recurring revenue for partners.

Cohesity

Dan Monahan VP, Americas Channel Sales Monahan and his team made the way partners achieved their goals as important as achieving the goals themselves.

Net-new logos, as-aservice sales and number of active sellers are as important as achieving a sales goal.

Cisco Systems

Frank Lento Managing Director, Global Head, Partner Security Sales Organization

Lento aligned the partner program to partner success by providing tailored offers and incentives. This will result in incremental growth of over $200 million for partners working together side by side to protect customers.

Cisco Systems

Luxy Thuraisingam Head of Global Partner Marketing, SMB

The SMB marketing function this past year was placed under Thuraisingam’s leadership, and she has demonstrated early success with driving brand preference, designing a partner-focused digital lead engine and simplifying tools.

Citrix, a Cloud Software Group

Mike Fouts VP, Global Service Providers

Fouts strengthened the focus of channel accounting for the evolution of what partnership looks like industrywide. He brought service provider partners to the forefront, expanding their presence within the ecosystem.

Comcast Business and Masergy

Craig Schlagbaum

SVP, Indirect Channels Schlagbaum started the channel program at Comcast Business over 11 years ago and has been leading it every year since. Over the past year, he has been a driving force in bringing the Comcast Business and Masergy teams together.

Cisco Systems

Andrew Sage VP, Global Distribution, SMB Sales

With Sage leading the way in bringing SMB into the channel, Cisco will see incremental benefits accrued by partners and SMB customers. This is a channel-led business and the proximity to key routes to market will drive greater investment.

Cisco Systems

Oliver Tuszik SVP, Global Partner Sales, GM, Routes To Market

Tuszik scaled different routes to market in a partnerfirst motion, implemented a new value-based partner certification, and prioritized significant investments to reduce partner complexity in their sales operations and in Cisco’s incentive programs.

Cloudera

Rachel Tuller Head of Global Partner Strategy, Programs, Alliances

Tuller aligned the partner strategy to Cloudera’s overall go-to-market motion. She also brought in the people with great skill sets who crafted a vision, set out on a path to accomplish it, and did so within a year.

Commvault

Alan Atkinson Chief Partner Officer

As a key goto-market technical resource, Atkinson helped structure much of Commvault’s current channel strategy and developed a baseline approach that he will be rolling out as the company’s chief partner officer.

Cisco Systems

Denzil Samuels VP, Global Customer Experience Partner Success

Samuels conducted more than 270 CEO strategic discussions with partners globally. He also hired and trained customer experience (CX) specialists globally and increased CX partner certifications by 130 percent.

Cisco Systems

José van Dijk VP, Global Partner Performance, Experience

Van Dijk continued to invest and expand capabilities in additional routes to market while also working to simplify the partner experience. Managed services are essential to the strategy to shift the portfolio to be consumed as a service.

Cloudflare

Matthew Harrell Global Head of Channels, Alliances

H arrell delivered 50 percent year-overyear growth in channel bookings, built on Cloudflare’s service delivery catalog and capabilities and launched a zero trust partner program, the Cloudflare One Partner Program.

Compliancy Group

Paul Redding

VP, Partner Engagement, Cybersecurity

Selling compliance and security together has been hard for MSPs. Redding created messaging that has been successful in selling nontraditional tools, making it easier to sell compliance. Compliance became the launching pad to justify other services MSPs sell.

ComputerVault

Marc Zarrella

VP, Head of Revenue, Partnerships

Zarrella secured partnerships with TD Synnex and Arrow Electronics. Through building relationships, he was able to deliver the ComputerVault value proposition from a channel partner ecosystem and end customer perspective.

ConnectWise

Natalie Suarez

Principal Solutions Advisor, Cybersecurity

Suarez launched the Evolve Cybersecurity Peer Group and Cybersecurity Product Advisory Council, where best cybersecurity practices for all ConnectWise products are recommended. She is also an IT Nation Certify Instructor.

Cradlepoint

Tony Puopolo VP, Sales, Service Providers Puopolo added 30 percent more head count to the U.S. MSP sales team, growing the business faster than any other area. He also expanded the MSP programs from the U.S. market and launched across Europe.

Cribl

Zachary Kilpatrick VP, Channels

Cribl has spent the past year not only defining what its vision for a channelfirst strategy means, but also building it. Kilpatrick worked with leadership to institute a channel team that’s instrumental to Cribl’s routes to market across the partner ecosystem.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Conceal

Phil Labas

Sr. Director, Global Channels, Alliances Labas launched the Conceal Allies Partner Program that encompasses resale, integration, distribution and MSP offerings. He also recruited the top partners in each area and helped build joint go-to-market strategies for each.

Corelight

Rick Beattie VP, Sales

Beattie led the way as Corelight makes it its mission to train every partner under contract and roll out a specific testing program for them. This enables the company to work more closely with channel partners and help identify opportunities.

Cradlepoint

Eric Purcell SVP, Global Partner Sales Purcell’s investments in the Global Partner Program have impacted Cradlepoint’s continued success and record revenue. Some areas of investment include the managed services program, which is seeing record growth.

Critical Start

Dwayne Myers VP, Channel, Alliances

M yers developed a process for identifying partners that fit an ideal profile, which allows teams to align within a particular territory and drive business focus. He also launched a rewards program unique to industry partners.

Congruity360

Morgan Hartley Director, Global Channels

Hartley vetted, identified and activated key channel partners, created a tiered volume pricing model with builtin rebate incentives and developed a hands-on instructor-led partner enablement boot camp.

Coupa

Sally Stephens SVP, Alliances Programs

Stephens focused on up-leveling Coupa’s relationships with partners. Giving them resources, support and trust, the company accomplished record-breaking results. She also expanded her team to drive go-tomarket, partner marketing and channel operations.

Cradlepoint

Lisa Wight VP, Global Partner Programs, Worldwide Distribution Wight boosted the impact her team has by adding top talent to future-proof and enhance the partner program and global distribution ecosystem. She also established a robust engagement model.

CrowdStrike

Michael Rogers VP, Global Alliances, Channel Chief Rogers accelerated the launch of the new CrowdStrike Powered Service Provider, designed specifically for service providers. He also established a new Alliances Program Management Office team dedicated to updating CrowdStrike’s Partner Program.

ConnectWise

Andre Gilmore Director, IT Nation Programs

Gilmore built a team that will enable ConnectWise’s programs to grow for years to come. He expanded the private equity peer group offering and launched peer groups focused on sales and security.

John Muscarella VP, Channel Sales

Muscarella is responsible for the overall readiness strategy for the indirect business sales channels. His team develops, implements and sells offerings utilizing the Cox Communications network throughout the country.

Creatio

Alex Donchuk SVP, Global Channels

Donchuk led the way as Creatio achieved the following results: 52 percent of revenue was generated from partners, 97 percent of pipeline opportunities had a partner attached to them and 16 partners reached the highest levels of the program.

Ctera

Donald Wales SVP, North America

Wales grew the partner program to support partners’

success. Ctera has inked a strategic partnership with Wasabi to deliver secure cloud services and launched the newest version of Ctera Enterprise File Services exclusively via the channel network.

ConnectWise

Raffael Marty EVP, GM, Cybersecurity

Marty led efforts to expand the company’s cybersecurity offerings, including expanding the ecosystem through a new cyber insurance partnership between ConnectWise, ControlCase and Fifthwall Solutions.

Cradlepoint

Steve Benvenuto VP, Americas Partner Sales

Benvenuto expanded his team, adding new partner account managers and channel leaders. He also has accelerated engagement with some of the largest VARs in the Americas and has seen success partnering with a new set of ecosystem partners.

Crewhu

Stephen Spiegel CEO

Spiegel hired executives for his leadership team, increased investment with marketing partners in the channel and boosted investment in customer success, all of which contributed to over 40 percent growth in year-over-year recurring revenue.

CyberArk

Chris Moore SVP, Global Channels

CyberArk has focused on partners that are capable and committed and that will grow with it to drive value. Moore led several initiatives that drive constant communications, ensuring that each solution presented to a customer adds value and reduces pain points.

CyberPower

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

CyberReef

Cybersafe Solutions

Cyrebro

Cyware

Scott

Koller directed the refresh and relaunch of CyberPower’s most popular channel models. Invigorating this lineup with new features and competitive pricing ensures partners’ businesses stay healthy and relevant.

D&H Distributing

Tim Billing COO

Billing oversees D&H’s major manufacturer relationships, which are critical as the market has navigated supply chain disruptions. He has been called upon to work with vendors to source millions of pieces of technology for essential businesses and schools.

Databricks

Kori O’Brien SVP, Global Consulting, SI Partners

O’Brien was key to the launch of Databricks’ partner program focused on customer success, growth and industry at scale. This program led to a significant increase of partner-engaged consumption revenue and a partner ecosystem that doubled in size.

DataStream Insurance

Larry Meador Channel Chief Meador leveraged his experience and the relationships he has formed over years in the channel to educate DataStream Insurance on how it can best support MSP and MSSP partners and help them provide additional value to their customers.

Rachel Turkus SVP, Sales, Marketing

Turkus built a channel-first organization centered on the future of connectivity and of work by supporting partnerships with agents, VARs and MSPs. She also realigned the team into sales, partner success, sales operations, customer success and sales engineering.

D&H Distributing

Jason Bystrak VP, Modern Solutions

Bystrak was instrumental in developing the D&H Modern Solutions Business Unit, which helps channel partners develop and execute practices in transformative technology categories including applications, infrastructure, security and collaboration.

Datadobi

Charlie Collins Americas Channel Sales Director

As the leader of channel sales and business development efforts, Collins makes sure that the team goes above and beyond to meet corporate goals and spend as much time as possible in person with Datadobi partners.

Datto, a Kaseya Company

Michael DePalma VP, Business Development

Under the direction of DePalma, Datto closed out the third quarter with the strongest month in company history. This is a true testament to the channel since all of the company’s sales come from MSP partners. Now he is making a huge investment in partner enablement.

Rosana Filingeri VP, Business Development

Filingeri doubled Cybersafe’s channel presence and welcomed partners that support a wider scope of services, allowing the company to bring real-time detection and response to a more diverse group.

D&H Distributing

Peter DiMarco SVP, Commercial Sales

DiMarco is key to the new Partnerfi engagement community and has led the commercial team, supporting tens of thousands of high-growth partners. Among the critical growth areas are MSP services, XaaS, cloud, security, UC and collaboration.

Nader Soudah VP, Global Channel

Soudah opened relationships to key partners with a complementary customer base, increasing revenue pipeline. He also simplified the channel model to streamline partner on-boarding and training for success.

D&H Distributing

Tina Fisher VP, Vendor Management, Commercial Products

Fisher’s team has focused on the integration of video collaboration, including growing relationships with videoconferencing and display vendors. D&H offers collaboration bundles, certifications and the attachment of professional services.

Dataminr

Mike Houghton VP, Global Channel Sales

Together with the senior channel sales team, Houghton has on-boarded a global distribution partner, worked with the go-to-market team to operationalize and launch Dataminr’s channel program, and kicked off a Partner Advisory Council.

DDN

Kimberly Moran-Blad Head of Field, Channel Marketing Moran-Blad developed a three-phase strategy for building partnerships. Allowing partners to get to know DDN and strategically plan business objectives, this strategy has pulled in more than $7 million in business opportunities over the past 12 months.

Matthew Courchesne

Head of Channel

Courchesne launched a partner portal, created an Americas Partner Program with plans to replicate it globally and executed partnership agreements with three leading national security solution providers.

D&H Distributing

Greg King VP, Systems Business Unit

King was integral to the growth of D&H’s Components Business Unit. The unit launched in 2021 and nearly tripled its business within its first year. It supports deployments such as large-scale LED video walls for stadiums and esports projects.

Dataminr

Pankaj Kumar

Global VP, Partnerships

Kumar established a strategic relationship group from scratch. To build this, he identified the top 10 largest strategic partners for the company, created a new approach and model and reached out to the presidents and CEOs of these organizations.

Deep Instinct

Brian Feeney VP, Global Channels, Alliances

Feeney has focused on having the team build and launch Deep Instinct’s new partner program, Stratosphere. This innovative program is based on being simple, profitable and memorable—with a loyalty points approach and no medallion tiers.

Deepwatch

Lori Cornmesser SVP, Global Channel, Alliance Sales

Cornmesser started at Deepwatch with a focus on listening to partners to improve the partner experience and expand growth opportunities. The company has since seen increased deal registrations and partner margin and has acquired new end customers.

Delinea

Gagnon extended Delinea’s reach within public sector by adding dedicated channel account management and channel marketing resources. Creating committed channel resources led to accelerated revenue for federal/SLED-focused partners.

Dell Technologies

Christina Crowley

SVP, Global Partner Services Sales

Crowley is responsible for leading sales, operations and go-to-market strategies for Dell’s end-to-end service portfolio through the channel. Her team is focused on driving more profitability to partners so they can deliver greater value to customers.

Devo

Gary Pelczar VP, Global Alliances

Pelczar helped a new Devo managed services partner grow revenue by 1,200 percent. He also expanded the channel team in the Asia-Pacific region and signed a strategic systems integrator.

DirectDefense

Jared Ballou

VP, Business Development, Strategic Alliances Ballou led the organization in laying the foundation for a nationwide channel program initiative to better service customers. He also guided the program in a strategic direction in order to grow revenue.

Delinea Timothy

Dell Technologies

Dell Technologies

Dell Technologies

SVP, Global Channels, Alliances

New to Delinea, Puccio leads the global partner ecosystem that consists of VARs, global systems integrators, strategic alliances and technical partners. He has over 25 years of channel and sales experience in the software industry.

Dell Technologies

Rola Dagher Global Channel Chief

When she started in her role, partners asked Dagher for more program simplification. She challenged her team to reduce the silos between partner types and began this change in fiscal year 2023. She is now working on greater simplification for fiscal year 2024.

DH2i

Jamie Hawkins Director, Marketing

DH2i has expanded into new verticals such as government and new geographies such as Korea. Hawkins had to develop and deliver tailored value propositions and go-to-market plans that enabled new partners to hit the ground running.

Dropbox

Kimberly Cesena Sr. Director, Global Head of Channel, Field Marketing Cesena created a channel narrative about the state of the channel and three-year vision for Dropbox. She also drove an engagement strategy for the channel by branding and delivering consistent channel partner newsletters and monthly webinars.

Gregg Ambulos SVP, North America

Channel Sales Ambulos enhanced the sales engagement model to align Dell’s core selling engine more closely with the partner community. He expects this to lead to a more predictable and collaborative selling experience.

Dell Technologies

Driss el Ougmani

VP, Global Specialty Sales, Presales

El Ougmani improved coverage for Dell’s channel partners by introducing internal resources to complement specialty and presales. He has invested in tools to make it easier for partners to conduct business.

Dialpad

Mike Kane SVP, Worldwide Channel Sales Dialpad’s channel program has experienced tremendous growth under Kane’s direction as he has been hard at work recruiting top personnel. He not only recruits top talent but also helps accelerate their channel careers.

Druva

Robert Brower SVP, Worldwide Partners, Alliances Brower led the charge in spearheading Druva’s Strategic Collaboration Agreement with AWS. The agreement underscores both companies’ commitment to delivering a 100 percent SaaS solution to meet customer needs.

John Byrne

President, Sales, Global Theaters

Byrne leads Dell’s strategy to grow all routes to market and designed the go-tomarket plan to fast-track that collaboration. As of second-quarter fiscal year 2023, Dell holds No. 1 positions in the majority of critical IT infrastructure categories.

Dell Technologies

Denise Millard SVP, Global Alliances

Millard is passionate about the value the partner ecosystem brings in delivering purpose-built solutions for customers. She is a vocal champion of that impact and potential, both internally and externally. She works hard to put partners and customers first.

DigiCert

Cameron Nelson Director, Strategic Growth

Nelson led the global integration and redesign of DigiCert’s channel partner programs with over 1,500 global partners. This included setting up new workstreams focused on program design, partner marketing, enablement, sales, product integration and more.

DTEX Systems

Brian Stoner VP, Worldwide Channel, Alliances Stoner joined DTEX Systems in July 2022 with over 20 years of experience in cybersecurity and channel sales partnerships. He leads the company’s channel program across all regions, supporting and engaging DTEX’s entire partner ecosystem.

Cheryl Cook

SVP, Global Partner Marketing Cook led partner/ marketing strategy that drove demand and another historic year for Dell and partners in fiscal year 2022. She also drove partner thought leadership on the importance of partner ecosystems and strategic initiatives.

Dell Technologies

Darren Sullivan SVP, Global Partner Operations

Sullivan and his team have continued to drive demonstrable progress to transform partners’ end-to-end experience with Dell. This includes improvements in opportunity identification, deal registration, quoting and ordering, and postsales support.

Diligent

Ricardo Moreno SVP, Worldwide Partnerships Moreno is driving a cultural change to Diligent’s partnercentric model, including compensation, coverage, enablement and access to information. He is working to embed partners in everything the company does across the customer life cycle.

Dynabook Americas

James Robbins

GM Robbins is focused on maintaining the company’s channel-first, channel-best strategy and implemented a rebranding campaign. From a branding perspective, he took a bold approach with the overall look and feel to help set Dynabook apart.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

DZS

Tim Mendoza

Mendoza unlocked hyperfast broadband to the underserved and unserved. He led the growth of DZS channels in North America by 374 percent from 2020 to 2021. In 2022, DZS channels were poised to double from 2021.

Egnyte

Johnna Bowley VP, Global Partner Sales

B owley realigned Egnyte’s channel strategy to dramatically increase the percentage of revenue that goes through the channel. She also expanded the channel ecosystem to include distribution, resellers and alliance partners.

eSentire

Bob Layton Chief Channel Officer

Layton led the launch of the e3 ecosystem focused on mapping partner engagement, productivity and experience to how business leaders consume cybersecurity services. He also simplified the partner journey.

Expel

Timothy Roy VP, Partner Sales

Roy not only grew the channel program and strategy in North America, but also spearheaded a 100 percent channel sales model in EMEA, where Expel recently expanded. Partner revenue in North America increased over 300 percent in 2022 versus 2021.

Eaton

Steve Loeb VP, Distributed Infrastructure Sales

L oeb and the leadership team deployed the new Distributed Infrastructure sales organization, whose mission is to bring the combined expertise, bestin-class support and scale from legacy Tripp Lite and Eaton to the channel.

Eleveo

Brian Shore CEO

With Shore leading the way, Eleveo has grown its channel to over 350 partners worldwide and all of the company’s sales have gone through the channel. In addition, he has executed a partnership with Deloitte & Touche.

ESET North America

Ryan Grant VP, Sales Grant restructured ESET to be 100 percent channelfocused, ensuring partners have the personalized sales, technical and marketing support required to grow and go after bigger deals. He also led investments in innovation and ESET’s partner program.

ExtraHop

Wendy Hoey Sr. Director, Global Distribution, Channel Programs

In her new role at ExtraHop, Hoey will focus on understanding partners’ businesses and how to help them be more successful through the company’s ability to harness the power of network intelligence at the speed and scale of business.

Eaton

Hervé Tardy VP, Marketing, Strategy, Critical Power and Digital Infrastructure Division

Tardy led efforts to combine Eaton and Tripp Lite’s complementary goto-market strategies, defining a dual positioning that provides more breadth and coverage for the new entity while minimizing overlap.

Enzu

Dustin Young

Global VP, Channels, Alliances Young built a fully integrated sales strategy for geo-located sales support. He also delivered protected compensation for partners addressing customers that leave and come back in an as-a-service world.

Evo Security

David Powell CRO

Evo Security recently unveiled a key partnership with ConnectWise. Given Powell’s experience with Perch and ConnectWise, the company is prepared to help the ConnectWise sales team sell Evo Security into their customer base.

Extreme Networks

Scott Peterson SVP, Global Channels

When he joined Extreme less than a year ago, Peterson’s priority was helping to fully align the internal channel team with the partner ecosystem, enabling the company to drive more bookings and break the previous growth record.

Egnyte

Egnyte increased its partner count by over 70 percent under Anthony. He also expanded brand awareness by approximately 40 percent and grew the team with specific roles for partner enablement.

Epson America

Juan Carlos Castillo Director, Sales, Service, Robotics

Castillo addressed supply chain and credit issues, collaborated with partners to forecast true demand and identified the correct mix of products to meet customer needs. He also invested in channel marketing infrastructure.

Exabeam

Ted Plumis SVP, Channels, Strategic Go-To-Market Alliances Partners were a key part of Exabeam’s New-Scale SIEM product launch. Using feedback from partners and end users, Plumis launched a cloud-native portfolio of products that enables security teams everywhere to “detect the undetectable.”

F5

Lisa Citron

VP, Worldwide Channel Sales

Citron transformed F5’s channel approach beyond the

transaction. The outcome was the launch of the Global Partner Ecosystem organization, uniting channel partnerships, public cloud and managed services into one organization.

Egnyte

Chip

The Egnyte team has continued to grow over the past year both through external hiring and promoting from within. This has allowed Bieler and others to expand the program to more than 1,000 partners and increase revenue.

Ermetic

Scott Hoard

Head of Global Channel Sales

Hoard is new to Ermetic and since joining the programs he has launched are on target to deliver over 40 percent of revenue through the channel within 18 months. Upcoming programmatic launches on training and certification will provide a big boost.

Exclusive Networks

Brian Vincik SVP, North America Vincik has focused on building resources to offer vendor and partner support through sales, technical, operations and marketing. He also initiated a partnership with Cal Poly, enabling students to work alongside cybersecurity professionals.

First Orion

Michael Coleman SVP, Enterprise Sales, Channel Chief Coleman was a pivotal part of launching First Orion’s channel program, called the Partner Prime Program, and helping introduce the channel ecosystem to a technology such as branded communication.

Channel Chief View

NetApp Transforms Partner Experience

Q.How does your 2023 Channel Chief recognition illustrate your ongoing commitment to partners?

A. I pride myself on being an advocate for our partner community, serving as their collective voice. At NetApp, we want to add value to partnerships, while building relationships in a continually evolving ecosystem. My motivation centers around collaborating with diverse partners who are excited to learn, enact positive change and help our partnership thrive.

Personally, I championed the overarching strategy for NetApp to transform the partner business, including implementing collaborative models so partners received the tools, content and support to give partners what they need to succeed. NetApp has focused on improving collaboration, co-selling, training and enablement, while expanding strategic direction to power cloud, hybrid multicloud and on-premises business and effectively increase customer acquisition.

Q.What prompted evolving NetApp’s partner offering, creating the NetApp Partner Sphere?

A. As a partner-first organization with around 80 percent of revenues driven by these partners, NetApp listened to partner feedback to create an even better offering. Beginning this year, the NetApp Partner Sphere will offer new delivery models and highly specialized services through a cloud-focused and services-led program aimed to accelerate our partnership. This single-pathway program replaces the old system of multiple programs and brings every service in a central location. It will provide flexible consumption models for customers, so partners can add new capabilities to provide support throughout the customer journey. This program flexibility allows partners to find the right support to develop competencies and skills they previously didn’t have.

Q.How does NetApp plan to better serve partners in 2023?

A. NetApp is focused on the customer value journey. We know customers have many partners that provide a variety of services to help them accomplish their goals, but we aim to set our partners up for success. By giving them a wealth of options and services, NetApp aids and rewards partners for delivering value to their customers. This year, the Partner Sphere will have a three-tiered, give-and-get model, providing reciprocal value and a clear growth path. Partners can choose which level they want, with full transparency on what benefits are available for each. Accelerate cloud reach, discover new business opportunities and evolve along with us. When NetApp wins, partners win and customers benefit.

”

We want to add value to partnerships, while building relationships in a continually evolving ecosystem. My motivation centers around collaborating with diverse partners who are excited to learn, enact positive change and help our partnership thrive.

Five9

Jake Butterbaugh

SVP, Global Partners

Butterbaugh worked closely with his team to ensure streamlined communication throughout the organization. The team exceeded partner contribution goals and signed top partners around the globe.

Fortinet

Carl Cayton

Sr. Director, U.S. Channel System Engineering

Cayton expanded enablement efforts by hiring and dedicating more SEs to support distribution-led, regional, named partners. He also has trained more partners by focusing on efficiency.

Fortinet

Landon Scott

Sr. Director, Channel Operations

Scott integrated inside sales support for all customer segments into channel operations, providing a career pathway to create new SMB sales reps that have a channel-first mentality the day they start with the company.

Gluware

Colin Henry VP, Channel Sales

Since joining Gluware in January 2022, Henry has developed a strategic channel program that enables partners to quickly bring intelligent network automation solutions to customers, providing them with incremental service opportunities.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Flexential

Melissa McCoy VP, Channel Sales Partners

are key to Flexential’s success, and McCoy’s job is to ensure the channel is integrated across the organization. That awareness allows the channel program to run more efficiently and receive investment and resources to grow.

Fortinet

Aaron Griffith

Sr. Director, Channel Sales, U.S.

Under Griffith’s direction, Fortinet made significant investments in head count across channel leadership, partner management, marketing and engineering. These investments were made possible by the continued success of partners.

Fortinet

Curt Stratton

Sr. Director, Channel Distribution

Stratton is responsible for driving the overall vision, strategy and execution of partner recruitment, enablement and business development efforts through Fortinet’s network of distributors. He has 28 years of experience in the IT channel.

Google Cloud

Bronwyn Hastings

Corporate VP, Global ISV Ecosystems, Channels Hastings invested heavily in building partner skills and capacity to deliver quality outcomes through professional services. She continues to make significant investments through incentives to support higher-value specializations.

Forcepoint

Parag Patel SVP, Global Channel Sales Patel drove Forcepoint’s transformation into a channel-led company. He built go-tomarket offerings based on its data-first SASE platform and leveraged the expertise of MSSPs, global systems integrators, cloud providers and technology alliance leaders.

Fortinet

Greg LaBelle

Sr. Director, Channel Sales

LaBelle’s team was at the forefront of Fortinet’s enterprise strategy growth. He and the team worked with partners to build out Fortinet professional and managed services practices to improve both partner profitability and customer satisfaction.

Fortra

Renee Ritter VP, Channel

As Fortra grew, Ritter was called upon to redesign the previous channel program to meet the needs of a growing and diverse ecosystem. The new program has been recognized internally and externally for delivering high value to partners.

Google Cloud

Kevin Ichhpurani Corporate VP, Global Ecosystems, Channels Ichhpurani has spoken to partners about the importance of services and building deep expertise and certification with Google Cloud. Partners are seeing growth with customers as they shift to deliver critical services supporting digital transformations.

Forescout

Keith Weatherford VP, Worldwide Channel Sales

Weatherford expanded the Envision program to include new opportunities for existing partners and new ones. He also helped build on the Technical Forerunner Program by hosting Forescout’s first in-person conference.

Fortinet

Jennifer McDonald

Head of Channel Marketing

McDonald brought together partner sales, partner marketing, corporate communications and partner teams to align on one approach. By applying a messaging framework paired with digital, engagement has increased.

Freshworks

Hervé Danzelaud VP, Global Channels, Alliances Danzelaud relaunched the partner program with a new tiering system, an upcoming new commission model, a new technology platform for deal registration and a new sales enablement offering.

GoTo Technologies

Michael Day VP, Global Partner Sales Day has overseen the highest partner activation and participation statistics and is focused on expanding partners’ ability to sell the entire GoTo portfolio. He also created a dedicated partner enablement team to improve on-boarding.

Fortinet

Jon Bove VP, Channel Sales, U.S. Bove unveiled updates to the Fortinet Engage Partner Program that help create more growth opportunities for global partners. Moreover, to keep pace with the continued growth and success of partners, he increased head count across the channel team.

Fortinet

Michael O‘Brien

Regional VP, Strategic Routes to Market

O’Brien continued to refine the MSSP coverage model and portfolio strategy, enabling more focus on sales productivity and exceeding Fortinet’s growth expectations. He also redesigned key elements of the MSSP program.

Fusion Connect

Diane Frazzetta VP, Channel, Alliances

Frazzetta recruited and developed a regional strategic selling channel manager team nationwide and grew the strategic alliance program to include dedicated head count and the on-boarding of two national strategic partners to the overall partner base.

Gradient MSP

Colin Knox CEO

Knox has grown Gradient MSP from 15 employees to 50, reached 700 partners within a year, and is putting all of the company’s hard work and dedication toward serving MSPs and allowing them to realize their true potential.

Graphiant

Cory Kurtz Director, Channel, Managed Service Partners

Kurtz brings years of cloud and WAN architecture experience to the channel and MSP program at startup Graphiant. He blends business development, sales and technical skills to bring value to the largest VARs in the U.S.

Hitachi Vantara

Kimberly King

SVP, Strategic Partners, Alliances

King’s dayto-day role is to advocate for partners and ensure Hitachi Vantara is doing all it can to drive partner profitability and revenue through and with partners. She continues to prioritize flexibility and ease of doing business.

HP Inc.

Scott Lannum

VP, GM, North America Commercial Channel Sales

As the pace of change continued to accelerate, Lannum’s team accelerated with it, adapting to the market and supporting partners in addressing hybrid work. He also helped bring the Amplify program’s data insight to life with HP partners.

IBM

Richard Michos

CMO, Americas Ecosystem

Michos obtained internal investment to increase and rebuild the channel marketing staff. He also launched a program to deliver more IBM software through ISV and MSSP partners on prospects.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

HashiCorp

Leon Jones VP, Worldwide Partner Ecosystem Jones joined HashiCorp in July 2022. His focus is to build a highly integrated partner ecosystem spanning its largest global systems integrator partnerships to key systems integrators and resellers.

Horizon3.ai

Jennifer Lee

Head of Channel Sales

Lee rolled out the Horizon3. ai Partner Program. Understanding what assets partners need to be successful, she worked with a team to build netnew value propositions, solutions briefs and other key sales and marketing materials.

HP Inc.

Nick Tidd VP, Global Partner Organization Tidd created “Partner Journeys,” providing partners with the ability to learn more about Poly and add points through the Partner Program. He also improved HP’s quote speed from days to minutes, making it easier for partners to sell faster.

IBM

Kate Woolley GM, Ecosystem

Woolley rolled out an ecosystem-first go-to-market model in January. She also shifted IBM’s priorities and spearheaded program and portal updates to provide partners with more support, resources and skilling.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Jesse Chavez VP, Worldwide Partner Program, Operations Chavez guided selling practices, resulting in deep strategic relationships with partners. He also elevated partners’ ability to incorporate their own services into HPE GreenLake opportunities.

HP Inc.

Kobi Elbaz

SVP, GM, Global Channel Organization Elbaz has expanded the sustainability program, HP Amplify Impact, and enhanced HP Amplify Data Insights, its proprietary partner analytics platform. He also launched HP Curiocity, a new partner training and community engagement platform.

Huntress

Jordan Redd VP, Partner, Customer Success Redd has invested in the Partner Success organization’s role within the company. The added focus on true partner enablement is key and includes working with Huntress partners on product education.

IBM Security Services

Kandyce Tripp

Partner, Global Security Services Alliances

Tripp developed and now manages the Worldwide Security Services Strategic Alliance Partner Program in alignment with the business unit’s development and sales objectives.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Simon Ewington Partner Ecosystem Leader (Interim) Ewington is one of the driving forces behind HPE’s transformation into a channel as-a-service powerhouse. His commitment to ensuring partners are an extension of HPE is a big reason for GreenLake ecosystem sales growth.

HP Inc.

Laura Evans

Head of Global Channel Incentives, Distribution

Evans is transforming how HP goes to market with its channel. She launched new platforms for MDF, global promotions, demo and trade-in and is integrating a rebate platform to improve visibility for partners to track their quarterly results.

HYCU

Bogdan Viher

Head of Global Channels

Viher is working closely with channel and resell partners and their customers, articulating the value and advantages of purposebuilt data protection and disaster recovery solutions for multi-cloud and SaaS environments.

Identity Digital

Lisa Box SVP, Strategic Alliances, Business Development

Box leads

Identity

Digital’s efforts with strategic alliances and business development. She works with enterprise brands and agencies to spearhead adoption of descriptive domains across the globe.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Phil Soper North America Head of Partner Sales Soper focused on accelerating the transformation of HPE’s as-a-service channel ecosystem by attracting a new set of ecosystem partners to HPE’s edgeto-cloud platform, as well as expanding with HPE’s traditional partners.

HP Inc.

Jennifer Judy

Sr. Director, Global Partner Experience

Judy has transformed Poly’s partner portal to facilitate more of a one-touch transactional experience and accelerate the ability to drive revenue faster, created a video library to drive partner self-sufficiency and streamlined partner communications.

IBM

Natalia de Greiff VP, Americas Ecosystem

De Greiff’s goals have been to drive transformation and grow partnerships. IBM aims to become a leader in hybrid cloud and AI. For the ecosystem that means leveraging the role of IBM software and technology to create solutions alongside partners.

Identity Digital

Matt Overman CRO

Overman drove a channel expansion program specifically targeting partnerships outside historically standard channels. The program has seen tremendous interest and early adoption.

IGEL

Phil Eden

VP, North America Channel Sales

Working with IGEL’s leadership team, Eden created a plan for transitioning partners to a new subscription-based model. He also empowered his team to execute the IGEL Services Specializations program.

Infoblox

Chris Millerick

VP, Global Partner Sales, Alliances

Millerick refocused Infoblox on delivering a predictable, profitable and collaborative partner experience. He accomplished this by empowering partners with ease of access to enablement and certifications for sales, pre-sales and postsales professional services.

Ingram Micro

Therese Ferullo VP, U.S. Sales

Ferullo works with the team, vendors and customers to address the needs of the hybrid workforce. A key focus has been working with resellers to sell more solutions and valueadded services to their end users.

Scott Zahl

Zahl built out the Advanced Solutions business by further developing the hyperautomation practice, extending the global cybersecurity practice and creating and implementing programs to support the MSP community.

Impartner

Mark Rogers

SVP, Alliances, Strategic Relationships

Rogers expanded Impartner’s partner ecosystem by more than 150 percent by launching a global reseller route to market and adding new strategic partnerships. He also launched aggressive referral and reseller programs.

Infor

Salena Butler SVP, GM Butler built Infor’s Partner Advisory Council to gain tighter alignment with key partners. She also hired additional resources across marketing, sales, presales and go-to-market to support the company’s channel partners.

Ingram Micro

Darren Gottesmann

Executive Director, SMB, Midmarket Sales

Gottesmann brought partners and associates closer together through inperson events and more thoughtful conversations. He listens to partner needs via community councils and vendorpartner conversations.

INKY

Dave Baggett

Founder, CEO

Baggett has transitioned INKY from channelfriendly to channel-first. This evolution required organizational change and substantial investments to make INKY easy to manage and more profitable for MSPs.

Imperva

Jessica Couto VP, Americas

Couto has helped Imperva partners learn about the abundance of security offerings available to assist their customers with their security needs. With the support of the channel operations team, she also rolled out a spiff.

Ingram Micro

Craig Birmingham VP, GM, Business, Consumer Solutions Birmingham sets and oversees the direction and the business growth of the organization, as well as the customer experience delivered by his team. Under his direction the Business and Consumer Group has achieved double-digit growth.

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Imperva

Micheal McCollough

Global VP, Strategic Growth

McCollough developed an enablement strategy with relevant content more aligned to business goals and goto-market motions, which resulted in over 800 partner employees taking over 2,000 courses in less than five months.

Ingram Micro

Tony Celeste Executive Director, GM, Public Sector Celeste leads the strategy to profitable execution and growth for the new Ingram Micro Public Sector. He continues to transform the role of distribution in the public sector supply chain to add more value and an exceptional customer experience.

Ingram Micro

Eric Kohl VP, Security, Advanced Solutions

Kohl worked closely with the team and vendors to bring the channel go-tomarket strategy and MSP partner ecosystem to the forefront. In return, Ingram Micro has seen a marked change in the level of business engagement.

Instructure

Jack Jackson

VP, Global Channels

Jackson has created a robust partner program and inked a deal with Tech Data for distribution in emerging markets. He also signed over 100 resellers globally who completed the reseller enablement certification.

Infinidat

Mitch Diodato

Director, North American Channel Sales

Diodato transitioned Infinidat’s corporate strategy to be channel-led and to view partners as an extension of the sales and technical teams. The company now views partners as its path to success and the way to scale the business.

Ingram Micro

John Dusett Executive Director, Cloud Services, U.S.

Dusett expanded the distributor’s presence in Miami and Scottsdale, Ariz., and continued to invest in talent. He also introduced the Cloud Academy, a hybrid learning program to introduce sales and technical students to the cloud.

Ingram Micro

Cheryl Rang

Executive Director, Advanced Solutions, Data Center

Rang developed a hybrid cloud partner program and leveraged internal data and business intelligence to aid partners in targeting cross-sell and multivendor solutions in data center and hybrid cloud solutions.

Intel

John Kalvin VP, Sales, Marketing, Communications Group; GM, Global Partners, Support Kalvin is leading a transformation in how Intel works across its global ecosystem. He is helping reimagine the global partner organization, driving his team to focus on delivering partner value.

Intel

Jason Kimrey VP, U.S. Channel, Partner Programs

Kimrey launched the Intel Partner Alliance and worked to help partners get the resources they need. As part of this effort, he combined previously separate elements like Partner University, the Solutions Marketplace and Intel Studio into one portal.

for a more detailed look at each of our honorees

IntelePeer

Jeremy Jones

Chief Commercial Officer

A key partner was orchestrating a solution to modernize a large public utility company’s legacy voice system. Jones aligned the right team, provided executive sponsorship and saw the sale through to becoming the largest deal in IntelePeer’s history.

iXsystems

Brett Davis EVP

Davis has prioritized continuing to expand iXsystems’ international channel footprint by making sure the company drives over 90 percent of its international storage business through partners and focusing on emerging regions.

Juniper Networks

Gordon Mackintosh Group VP, Global Channels, Virtual Sales

Leading the charge to measure success against a partner’s profitability was a key focus for Mackintosh. The increase in profitability was between 150 percent and 200 percent year over year for elite partners.

Katalon

Matthew Sandberg

VP, Partnerships

Sandberg developed formal roles and responsibilities for the partnership organization and on-boarded new resources focused on global systems integrator alliances, partner marketing and technology partnerships.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Intermedia Cloud Communications

Jonathan McCormick COO, Head of Sales Intermedia focused on helping partners achieve success through a tumultuous time, and McCormick was key to that effort. Intermedia’s offerings are what partners’ customers need to keep employees connected amid hybrid and remote-work models.

JCI-Sensormatic/ Securitas

David Green Global Channels, Unified Commerce Leader Green strengthened ties among Latin America, Asia-Pacific, EMEA and North America sales leadership and channel partners. He is working on a global initiative to grow the channel-centric percentage.

Kamanja

Shay Cohen CEO

Kamanja was able to close its first partner in Israel a month after designing its partner program, a significant accomplishment for Cohen. The company also later conducted a few proofs of concept in the U.S. and closed three additional partners.

Keyfactor

Joseph Tong VP, Global Channels Program

Tong grew Keyfactor’s partner capabilities and further invested in the overall Keyfactor channel community. He initiated training certification programs to support partners with deeper product knowledge to better equip them to deliver solutions.

JFrog

Kelly Hartman SVP, Global Channels, Alliances

Hartman evaluated what was needed and quickly implemented initiatives with immediate results. She has added more partners in one quarter than in JFrog’s history and continues to add benefits while growing cloud revenue.

Kaseya

Amelia Paro Director, Channel Development Leading a team of channel evangelists at Kaseya, Paro brought the vision of Kaseya’s IT Complete platform to the market and to the company’s partners around the globe.

KnowBe4

Tony Jennings

EVP, International, Global Channel Sales Jennings rebuilt KnowBe4’s joint marketing program with the partner experience top of mind. The program is focused on simplicity and profitability for partners and enables them to further their market reach with proven marketing best practices.

Ironscales

Mark Fitzmaurice

SVP, Global Channels, Alliances

Fitzmaurice has built a modern channel program that differentiates and rewards invested partners while enabling them to deliver more value via accreditations, enablement, marketing toolkits and managed services.

Jitterbit

Ron Wastal SVP, Global Business Development, Alliances, Channels Wastal developed deeper coinnovation relationships with the leading cloud and SaaS platform ecosystems. These partnerships include CRM, e-commerce, ERP, cloud, IT and financial providers.

Kaseya

Dan Tomaszewski EVP, Channel

The rollout of a new channel program for MSPs for all Kaseya companies was one of Tomaszewski’s main accomplishments. There are now over 14,000 partners inside Powered Services today, and the number is growing.

Kodak Alaris

Leonel Da Costa

Americas Sales Managing Director

Da Costa had a key role in recent territory expansion.

Kodak Alaris recently expanded its portfolio with the S3000 Max Series and further developed its professional services. The company also rolled out its deal registration program in Latin America.

Ivanti

Michelle Hodges

SVP, Global Channels, Alliances

Hodges launched a partner portal, providing a personalized experience, life-cycle automation and alignment to a partner’s business model. She also rolled out Campaign Central, a self-service marketing automation platform.

JumpCloud

Antoine Jebara Co-Founder, GM, MSP Products

Jebara was integral to shaping JumpCloud’s MSP vision, mission and strategy. He also helped build the partner program, which provides MSPs with training programs and promotional collateral.

Kaspersky

Lisa Kilpatrick

Head of B2B Sales

Kilpatrick’s top accomplishment over the past year was keeping the sales and channel teams motivated during challenging times. She makes sure the channel is engaged and focused on selling Kaspersky products and are apprised of product launches.

Lacework

Brian Lanigan

VP, Worldwide Alliances, Channels

Since joining Lacework in March 2022, Lanigan has aligned the company around a partnerfirst go-to-market motion and is executing this mission around the globe, focusing efforts through a joint collaboration with CSP Alliances and channel and MSP partners.

Lacework

Faraz Siraj VP, Americas Channels

Siraj rolled out a “Power of 3” goto-market strategy where Lacework executed campaigns and events with CSP partners and Lacework and VAR/consulting partners, demonstrating the value deliverd to customers in securing their cloud environments.

Lightbits Labs

Charla Bunton-Johnson VP, Global Alliances, Channels

BuntonJohnson focused on growing the alliance and channel partner ecosystem to build out key solutions that solve customer problems. Her engagement with Intel has resulted in customer adoption and revenue generation in key vertical markets.

LogicMonitor

Michael Tarbet

Global VP, MSP, Channel LogicMonitor’s partner community continued to thrive across the U.S., EMEA and AsiaPacific. Tarbet launched the Channel 2.0 program to better align sellers with partners to help drive growth, certifications and rewards with partners.

Lumen

Dave Young

SVP, Midmarkets, Indirect Channel Young built APIs to give Lumen’s partners access to the data they need to best do business. A new Learn, Buy, Get, Use, Pay, Renew model empowers partners with more transparency into customer and product information.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Lansweeper

Christina Klein

VP, Global Channel Partners

Lansweeper has been a direct-sales organization since its inception in 2004. When Klein joined, her mission was to influence a cultural change that lead to a One Lansweeper sales organization. The company is now benefiting from that cultural evolution.

Liongard

Joe Alapat Co-Founder, CEO

Liongard was founded for MSPs to reduce manual labor to help them increase their bottom line. As Alapat grows the company, he is committed to learning about partners’ challenges and delivering an MSP software solution to solve them.

Logicworks

Sachin Bansal Channel Chief Bansal has nurtured the master agent channel at Logicworks to contribute 30 percent of all partner leads. He also spun up the distribution/VAR channel with Ingram Micro and WWT and launched a public sector practice with AWS.

Macrium Software

Jane Garrity Director, Channel, North America

In 2022, Garrity began leading the channel strategy and focusing on distribution and reseller partners. She has driven advancement of the Macrium brand into national accounts by strengthening distribution partnerships.

LastPass

Patrick McCue Global VP, Partners

McCue’s focus has been on building the LastPass Partner Sales organization, including a dedicated resell and distribution team. This ensures recruitment, engagement and programmatic offerings appeal to the right types of partners.

Liquidware

Anthony Keller Director, U.S. Channel Keller ramped up partner recruitment, enablement and training and expanded the channel team to assist with these efforts. He also increased MDF spending to facilitate demand generation and public awareness events and campaigns with strategic partners.

Logitech

Crystal Ferreira Channel Chief, Global Head of B2B Channel, Alliances Ferreira unified the business under a One Logitech umbrella with a partnerfirst mindset, focusing on data-driven decisions that helped target and align strategic partnerships, simplify business processes and enhance value selling.

Malwarebytes

Brian Thomas VP, Worldwide MSP, Channel Programs

In his first year, Thomas turbocharged the channel program by signing and enabling strategic partnerships, focusing on net-new MSP recruitment and adding new modules and add-on services for SMBfocused VARs and MSPs.

Lenovo

Pascal Bourguet VP, Channel Chief, COO, International Markets Bourget undertook a journey to federate business groups and global leaders behind Lenovo 360. He also launched Lenovo 360 Circle, a collaborative and comprehensive channel environmental, social and governance initiative.

LiveAction

Chris Braden SVP, Channels, Alliances

Braden redefined the partner program to focus on developing more strategic and productive partnerships. A tiered-medallion program, an MDF program, enablement curriculum and a forthcoming Partner Advisory Board will be key to growth.

Logitech

Anthony Graziano

Worldwide Head of Channel Marketing Graziano designed and implemented a global channel marketing Center of Excellence to deliver a One Logitech global channel marketing and MDF strategy, streamline partner communication and create channel-ready content.

Microsoft Nina Harding

Corporate VP, U.S. Global Partner Solutions

Upon joining Microsoft, Harding immediately unleashed a renewed focus on innovation, growth and listening to partners and customers. Going forward, she will focus on deeper partner specialization.

Lenovo

Rob Cato VP, North America Channel, ISO Cato is committed to meeting partners where they are in their journey with Lenovo. He says partners that leverage the company’s entire portfolio are uniquely positioned to create new revenue streams.

LiveVox

Dan DeLozier

Head of Global Channel, Alliances

DeLozier built a goto-market strategy for the company’s VAR program to expand top-line revenue and footprint in the partner community. He also increased the channel team head count by 200 percent.

Loqate, a GBG Solution

Justin Duling SVP, Commercial Director Duling aligned Loqate’s licensing models with partners to best enable them to provide value to their customers. He also collaborated with partners to accelerate their strategic cloud-first objectives.

Microsoft Julie Sanford VP, Partner GTM, Programs, Experiences, Global Partner Solutions

Sanford and her team led the development and launch of the Microsoft Cloud Partner Program, including program design, benefits and offers, solution partner designations, partner skilling and enablement, and digital experiences.

How To Succeed

The Rise Of The Hybrid Workforce Means Great News For Brother

Q. The pandemic changed business dramatically. What’s been the biggest difference for document technology?

A. The biggest difference is fewer people in the traditional office. With work from home, with satellite offices, almost everyone is a hybrid worker to some degree. On top of that, the pandemic basically forced companies to start doing business digitally. This means more digital documents and fewer printed documents. So, for our industry, the headline is that in-office print volumes are way down. Those lower print volumes are great news for Brother! The hybrid workforce is a decentralized workforce, and most of those workers still need to print, scan and copy. Before the pandemic, big, centralized devices may have made sense. Today, companies need smaller devices in more locations. It’s like the business world just pivoted toward Brother.

Q. So, there’s a new business printing landscape. How is Brother supporting it?

A. We have new printers and all-in-ones — our fastest and most advanced color lasers ever. At the high end, Brother A4 devices can now handle all the printing and document management at our customers’ main offices, more cost-effectively than big A3s. For work-from-home, it’s the opposite story — employees need devices that are more robust, because they’re doing a lot of their work without going to the office. We have new products specifically built for corporate home office environments. Security — that’s another thing. With the hybrid workforce and all those different locations, there’s even more pressure on data security. And security continues to be a real strength for Brother, at all three levels: device, document and network. Did you know that our devices don’t have a hard drive? That virtually eliminates one of the major risks that our competitors need to worry about. That’s an advantage for Brother.

Q. What are some of the other advantages of partnering with Brother?

A. Like I said, the business world now needs exactly what Brother offers. The opportunity is better than ever, for larger customers especially, and we need partners to make it happen. Just as importantly, we are a great company to work with. There is no bureaucracy and lots of personal contact. One partner said, “Brother supports us in almost too many ways to count.” I hear things like that all time. At Your Side — it’s our tagline for a reason: it sums us up perfectly.

Learn more about partnering with Brother: teamwithbrother.com

”The traditional, centralized office is gone forever.

We see that as a huge opportunity.

Microsoft

David Smith

VP, Worldwide Channel Sales Smith has been laserfocused on building and growing Microsoft’s ecosystem of partners in the U.S. and around the world, helping them realize their own business goals through skilling, enablement and co-selling.

MongoDB

Alan Chhabra EVP, Worldwide Partners, U.S. Public Sector, Asia

Chhabra steered MongoDB’s entry into a new strategic alliance with AWS. MongoDB also unveiled significant expansions to its existing partnerships with Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud, including pay-as-you-go offerings.

N-able

Davide Di Labio

Sr. Director, Sales

Di Labio created a new N-able team that is centered around forging more intimate relationships with top existing accounts, engaging with organizations growing via M&A and building a new sales model targeting large MSPs.

Nerdio

Joseph Landes

Co-Founder, CRO

Landes increased Nerdio’s sales and grew the sales and marketing organization significantly to best support its growing partner base. In 2022, he launched three new event series: CEO Summit, Stadium Series and Nerdio Training Camp.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Mimecast

N oha was instrumental to the launch of Mimecast’s new Email Security, Cloud Integrated gateway-less offering. He also executed on MSP program enhancements that make it easier and more streamlined for MSP partners to do business with the company.

Morpheus Data

Dan Miller Sr. Director, Channel Sales

Miller led efforts to focus activities on top OEM partners, including HPE, Dell and Lenovo. He prioritized channel partner activities and joint pursuit programs on those shared partners also operating at scale with those OEMs.

N-able

Stefanie Hammond

Head Sales, Marketing Nerd Hammond continues to make a difference in partners’ business, expanding on N-able’s Head Nerds program and global partner success manager team. She also has enhanced professional services and peer-to-peer programs.

Nerdio

Will Ominsky

Sr. Director, MSP Sales

Ominsky worked tirelessly to lead Nerdio’s MSP sales team into another record-high sales year. He also led the charge in rolling out Nerdio’s revamped partner program, Partnerd, and a new educational events series.

Mimecast

Dan Purtell Director, Channels East/ Canada

Because Mimecast’s new Email Security, Cloud

Integrated offering was built to sell through the channel, Purtell equipped partners with special discounting and incentives and incremental channel MDF budget to drive high demand.

N-able

Kevin Bury SVP, Chief Customer Officer

Bury continued to push for the growth and awareness of N-able’s partner success efforts. The Partner Success Management team has grown to over 90 people whose sole job is to support partners and focus on retention and advocacy.

N-able

Dave Weeks VP, Partner Experience

Weeks built out N-able’s global community and channel to foster peer-to-peer engagement. He also created advanced content for the Empower North America event, fostering MSPs learning from peers, and enhanced the Partner Advisory group.

Netacea

Kirk Horton VP, Channels, Partners

Horton launched the Netacea NetElite Partner Program from the ground up, with 20 of the industry’s leading partners participating as inaugural members to bring the company’s security services to customers.

Mitel

Daren Finney SVP, Global Channels

Finney reset Mitel’s Global Partner Program, now rooted in a customer life-cycle management philosophy. This vision for the partner ecosystem enables partners to be more strategic with existing customers and demonstrate value to grow new opportunities.

N-able

Frank Colletti

EVP, Worldwide Sales

Colle tti embarked on a worldwide tour to meet face to face with as many global partners as possible and visited about 10 countries. This was critical for the partner ecosystem, especially coming out of the pandemic.

Nasuni

Brian Shillair VP, Worldwide Channels

Shillair offered partners insight into Nasuni marketing intelligence, now responsible for 35 percent of meetings scheduled by partners. He also found a way to measure the influence of a channel partner.

NetApp

Jenni Flinders SVP, Worldwide Partner Organization Flinders led and defined the overarching strategy and focus areas for the organization to transform the partner business. She implemented a structured rhythm of business across key groups to ensure partners received the needed support, tools and content.

Mitel

Frank Skiffington SVP, Americas Sales

S kiffington reorganized Mitel’s Americas business to focus on growing UC market share by delivering a channel-focused strategy. This included resetting job roles across teams and establishing an on-premises-to-cloud model for partners.

N-able

Mike Cullen GM, RMM

Cullen has done more around listening to the needs of partners and investing in mutual success. He is focused on scaling operations, expanding the current book of business and landing more business together with N-able’s MSPs.

Nerdio

Natasha Boyko

Sr. Director, Partner Programs, Community Boyko planned and facilitated all events put on and attended by Nerdio. She also coordinated the logistics behind 50 Nerdio Training Camps and Nerdio’s partner conference, NerdioCon.

NetBrain

Alex Alvarez SVP, Partners, Alliances Alvarez built out a professional channel team focused on the joint success of partners and customers. He worked with operations, marketing, field sales and technical teams to build the infrastructure for a modern channel business.

NetDocuments

Reza Parsia VP, Partnerships

Parsia rolled out a new partner program for the company. He also increased channel sales by double digits, doubled the number of new partners in the NetDocuments ecosystem and developed a new and enhanced ISV program.

Netskope

Sommer Newman VP, Global Systems Integrators, Managed Security Services

Newman has matured the global systems integrator go-to-market strategy, developing a global framework and multistep maturity matrix. She also identified strategic partners and implemented a globalregional support structure.

Nexsan

Read Fenner

VP, Global Sales Fenner drove a level of flexibility that empowered partners to remain fully prepared to adapt to changing customer behavior, budgets and requirements. Partners not only maintained and grew current customer relationships, but won new business.

Nullafi

Walter Specht Jr.

VP, Channel Sales

Specht launched a new channel program for Nullafi and recruited the company’s first international partners. He also instituted a seniorleadership-sponsored 100 percent channel sales model.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Netenrich

Justin Crotty SVP, Channels

Crotty developed key partnerships and relationships with Google security and channel sellers. This resulted in growing engagement with key security-oriented solution providers focused on driving data analytics in their managed security services to their customers.

Netskope

David Rogers SVP, Global Alliances, Channel Sales Rogers steered the growth of Netskope’s service provider team. He was at the forefront of a crossfunctional strategy that created unique, embedded solutions to deliver fully integrated Security Service Edge offerings.

Nextiva

Olen Scott VP, Channel Sales

Scott has only been with Nextiva for a few months, but he will be focused on the new Nextiva Partner Program, which is based on simplicity, flexibility and profitability and allows partners to work with Nextiva based on their preferred sales motion.

Nutanix

Christian Goffi

VP, Americas Channel Sales

Goffi has improved the manner in which Nutanix manages partners, which included joint business plan creation with top partners, market intelligence to allow them to map to the regional strategy, and tracking to support new logo initiatives.

Netreo

Richard Drewelow VP, Sales, Channels, Americas Drewelow launched a partner program for Netreo and helped the company achieve double-digit growth while moving from a 70 percent direct to 70 percent indirect business model in preparation to shifting to 100 percent channel sales.

Netsurion

John Addeo CRO

Addeo has restructured Netsurion’s go-to-market team for a channel-first strategy. He also has increased channel investment from presales to customer success, partner management and marketing.

Nitel

Jim Glackin EVP, Channel Sales

Over the past year, Glackin has increased Nitel’s portfolio of partners. He also introduced a new role that ensures an appropriate level of responsiveness to the needs of partners selling transactional and strategic business.

Nvidia

Alvin Da Costa

VP, Global Partner Organization

Da Costa focused on establishing Nvidia’s GSI Organization, recruiting top global systems integrators and building various solutions by industry. He was able to generate over $50 million in pipeline so far and has several large Fortune 100 deals.

Netskope

Kristin Carnes VP, Global Channel Programs, Strategy

Carnes established a new pricing and discounting strategy, resulting in partners having predictable and profitable pricing for their customers. Partners can quote and sell independently of the sales team, leading to increased deal registrations.

NeuShield

Steve Bottini Channel Chief

Bottini signed two boutique partners that have produced leads and deals for NeuShield. Combined, the two partners were poised to be responsible for 40 percent of the company’s sales revenue for 2022.

Noname Security

Mike Baker CRO

Leveraging Noname Security’s channel program, Baker helped lead three funding rounds, resulting in the first API security unicorn. He also ensured sales operates with a neutral compensation plan that directs and accelerates partner business.

Nvidia

Cathy Timmerman

Sr. Director, Global Partner Programs, Strategy Timmerman integrated the Mellanox PartnerFirst Program into Nvidia’s NPN Program to support networking partners post-acquisition. In addition to this, she took the ISV Program from a pilot phase to a core program within the NPN Program.

Netskope

Melissa Nacerino VP, Global Channels, Alliances Marketing Nacerino introduced new and innovative partner promotions and revamped the portal to deliver a better user experience and simplified navigation. She also continued to deliver customizable marketing campaigns to help partners generate pipeline.

New Relic

Riya Shanmugam

Group VP, Global Alliances, Channels

New Relic’s new channel program provides partners with the products, pricing and skills needed to democratize observability. Shanmugam has invested in partner development and improved the ease of doing business.

Noname Security

Michele Shear

Channel Director

Shear grew the partnership with Guidepoint Security, resulting in large strategic revenue closing. She also expanded several focus partners’ pipelines by increasing in-person presence with partner leadership.

Nvidia

Craig Weinstein

VP, Americas Partner Organization

Weinstein was key to delivering Nvidia’s first $1 billion annual partner contribution in fiscal year 2021. He also redefined the routeto-market model. Nvidia offerings sit at the epicenter of a very large and broad AI and accelerated computing ecosystem.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Observe.AI

Jon Heaps VP, Channel

Heaps built a team of established channel veterans who joined an unknown vendor to the partner community and generated tremendous awareness in a short period of time. The team has now built a program that brings in 40 percent of overall revenue.

Opengear

Bryan Keepers Director, Channel Sales Americas

Keepers combined efforts with account mapping and net-new customer sales incentives to create millions in revenue and tens of millions in pipeline as well as increasing the overall reseller base.

Oracle

Ross Brown SVP, Partner Ecosystem, Professional Services

Brown is moving Oracle to a partnerled model with Oracle Alloy, a complete cloud infrastructure platform that enables partners with a full range of cloud services to expand their business.

Palo Alto Networks

Anar Desai VP, Americas Channels

Desai is ensuring partners lean in more to bring their customers a partnership that helps address the attack surface across their entire enterprise by providing solutions for network, cloud and endpoint security.

Okta

Bill Hustad SVP, Partners, Alliances

Hustad pivoted the partner strategy to leverage more partner motions while looking to magnify the value coming out of the existing partner goto-market. A key theme has been reinvestments in service integrator and provider strategies.

OpenText

Cybersecurity

Justin Gilbert

Sr. Director, MSP Channel Development, Cybersecurity Solutions Under Gilbert’s leadership, the company empowered partners during the shift to Microsoft’s New Commerce Experience, helping them layer on high-value services from its security and compliance portfolio.

Oracle

Dale Weideling Group VP, North America Cloud, Technology Alliances, Channels Weideling reinvested in global systems integrators, assigning partner manager and cloud architects developing the North America Oracle Cloud Infrastructure practice and propelling engagement.

Palo Alto Networks

Tom Evans VP, Worldwide Channel Sales Evans was focused on building the partner of tomorrow, implementing a comprehensive channel sales strategy focused on frictionless selling, routeto-market expansion and continued partner program evolution.

One Identity

Andrew Clarke Global Head of Channels, Alliances Clarke enhanced partner portal content through better navigation and relevance. He also improved partner enablement to instill business and presales skills and launched a “partner perspectives” series for deep technical product learning.

OpenText

Cybersecurity

Ghassan Lababidi

VP, Partner Marketing, Enablement, Cybersecurity Solutions

Lababidi has been leading the charge in launching a new channel program. Accomlishments included building out key benefits and driving sales alignment to ensure business growth.

Oracle NetSuite

Craig West GVP, Channel Sales, Alliances

West led the way as more Oracle NetSuite partners experienced record years and unprecedented revenue, growth and customer acquisition. The partner ecosystem is larger and healthier than ever.

Palo Alto Networks

Karl Soderlund SVP, North America Ecosystem Sales Soderlund rolled out a specialization program based on partner demand. This specialization enables partners to become more profitable and allows the company to bring new technologies to market quickly through them.

Onit

Marc Palombo VP, Strategic Alliances

Palombo grew Onit’s partner deal pipeline by over 300 percent, a record year for partner-involved deals. Onit AppBuilder certifications are up over 300 percent and partner leads are converting at over 30 percent to drive joint sales pipeline.

Ooma

Dave Beagle Sr. Director, Business Channel Sales

Beagle launched Ooma AirDial, a POTS replacement offering designed for life-safety applications, through the channel. This has enabled partners to “land and expand” and increased the opportunity flow over 40 percent from the previous year.

Khoury reorganized sales and customer success teams around partnerdriven sales. This has included targeting OEMs and global systems integrators and training teams to pursue those accounts.

Paessler AG

Peter Campisi

Regional Manager, Channel Sales, North America

Campisi reorganized the channel team to better enable partner growth and development. Paessler AG is now better positioned to develop closer relationships with partners by starting with a solid business plan.

Pax8

Jennifer Bodell SVP, Channel

With Bodell’s leadership, Pax8’s education and enablement programs have become critical to partners’ success. They provide insight into how Pax8 can enable their business and empower their success.

Porro led the global channels strategy to deliver growth of net-new logos by over 2X, the overall new business (net-new logo plus expansion) by over 3X and the partner ecosystem year over year by almost 100 percent.

Paessler AG

Mike Gonzalez VP, Sales, Marketing, Americas Gonzalez realigned the team more closely with Paessler AG’s most active partners to better understand where growth opportunities lie. This allows the company to bring more value to those partners.

Pax8

Nick Heddy Chief Commerce Officer Heddy worked with Microsoft, helping it understand the impact New Commerce Experience has had on the channel. He also was integral in adding AWS to Pax8’s portfolio, providing partners access to another key hyperscaler.

Pax8

Ryan Walsh

COO

Walsh led the expansion of Pax8’s product offering globally with brands including Intuit, Amazon and Adobe as well as vendors such as CyberCNS, Pillr and Exclaimer. He also presented at numerous industry events.

Pondurance

Tim Horigan Director, Channel North America

Horigan focused on execution, adjusting and growing. He increased the number of Pondurance partners by 23 percent and significantly increased channel contributions to opportunities and revenue.

Pure Storage

Mike Marinchak VP, Americas Partner Sales

Marinchak was recently promoted to his new position and so far has increased partner value and contributions and drove investments in attracting new customers to Pure through its 100 percent partner model.

Quantexa

Dax Aiken VP, Global Alliances

Aiken achieved 130 percent of the channel sales revenue target in his first 12 months in his role. He also acquired five new partner-led sales logos to Quantexa and created a partner-led program to land and expand Quantexa in the Middle East.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Pegasystems

Judy Buchholz SVP, Global Partner Ecosystem

In her first four months in her role, Buchholz identified gaps and worked to close them by building the communities’ collective view of each partner team member’s roles so that the organization owns the success of the team.

Proofpoint

Jason Eberhardt Global VP, Cloud, MSP

Eberhardt built a global team with leaders in Asia-Pacific Japan and EMEA, as well as with existing leaders in North America. He also evolved Proofpoint’s strategy to include PSA and RMM companies.

Pure Storage

Gary Matson VP, Worldwide Partner Go-To-Market, Programs

Matson helped facilitate the expansion of go-tomarket teams to ensure partners are at the center of everything Pure does. He also helped build out an enhanced partner program and benefits.

Quantum

James Mundle Global Channel Chief Mundle has focused on making it easier and more beneficial for partners to do business with Quantum, including simplified pricing and expanded business model offerings. He also developed Smart Bundles at predetermined price points.

phoenixNAP

Peter Maher Director, Channel Sales

Maher created and executed a go-tomarket strategy for new product positioning with channel partners. He also launched an education forum for existing and new partners centered on infrastructure.

Proofpoint

Chari Rhoades VP, Americas Channel

Rhoades led Proofpoint’s Americas channel team in delivering year-over-year growth in new business, expanding the awareness of Proofpoint across diverse partner types, and improving the engagement and alignment of partners.

Pure Storage

Wendy Stusrud VP, Global Partner Sales

Stusrud integrated Pure’s global systems integrator and MSP teams, creating a program around the managed services route to market. She also drove Pure’s channel initiatives around environmental, social and governance.

Quantum Metric

Raj Ramanujam VP, Worldwide Partners, Alliances

Ramanujam is expanding the company’s Google Cloud partnership with a dedicated organization and PMO governance. He also is building out the Quantum Metric Partner Network with technology and solution partner programs.

PIA

Tim Coach

Global Channel Chief

Coach is creating the U.S. and then worldwide channel program. He is also planning and executing channel events, creating a channel team and making key recommendations for other positions in the U.S.

Proofpoint

Joe Sykora SVP, Worldwide Channel, Partner Sales Sykora put a partner organization in place for partners to work with and aligned all aspects of the business. He also rolled out multiple new routes to market for partners to consume Proofpoint’s technology along with some key product specializations.

Qlik

Molly Burns VP, Sales, North America Partnerships

Burns grew her team by 100 percent and added a new U.S. West leader and partner development lead. She also recruited over 20 strategic partners to uplevel the channel and extend Qlik’s market reach.

Quest Software

Todd Werner Global VP, Channels, Alliances

Werner restructured the partner program to better meet the needs of larger partners, investing heavily in leadership as well as programs to drive more partner-originated revenue and, in turn, more revenue and profitability for partners.

Pillr

Mike Cannell Director, Channel Sales

At startup

Pillr, Cannell has built a team that is fully invested in channel partnerships. Pillr offers a cybersecurity operations platform that helps solution providers deliver a complete security solution and meet customers’ 24/7 security demands.

PTC

Stuart Heavyside

Channel Chief

Heavyside delivered a channelready SaaS PLM system for partners to bring to their customers and drove operational efficiency to decrease friction in PTC’s ongoing commercial relationship, thereby increasing agility and speed to market.

Qualys

Suzanne Swanson SVP, Global Partners

Swanson restructured channel pricing, creating a level playing field for partners of all sizes. She also was instrumental in initiating the development of Qualys’ first partner program, building a channel team globally.

Quickbase

Mark Dillon SVP, Partners, International Sales Dillon has narrowed Quickbase’s focus from 180-plus channel partners to less than 100 through the new partner program model. This intentional focus on strategic, revenuegenerating partners has provided a road map for partner success.

Cast your votes at CRN.COM MADNESS

Dan Tomaszewski

Kaseya

Christian Go

Nutanix

Oliver Tuszik

Cisco Systems

Shannon Sbar

Schneider Electric

David Weeks

N-able

Jenni Flinders

NetApp

Steve Loeb

Eaton

Phil Soper

Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Scott Mann Scale Computing

Rola Dagher

Dell Technologies

Scott Lannum HP Inc.

Kimberly King

Hitachi Vantara

Donna Grothjan

Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company

Jason Kimrey

Intel

James Robbins

Dynabook Americas

Rob Cato

Lenovo

CHOOSE YOUR

It starts with 32 of most prominent channel with one. CRN’s Channel Madness Tournament pits some of the channel’s ential executives against head-to-head battles readers vote to determine Cast your votes at CRN.com/madness starting March

YOUR CHIEF

of the industry’s channel chiefs. It ends CRN’s ninth annual Tournament of Chiefs channel’s most influagainst each other in battles where CRN determine the victor. CRN.com/madness

March 16.

VOTING OPENS MARCH 16

Ruba Borno

Amazon Web Services

Kevin Rooney

Veeam Software

Kevin Ichhpurani

Google Cloud

Stefanie Chiras

Red Hat

Jonathan McCormick

Intermedia

Nina Harding Microsoft

Kate Woolley

IBM

Ricky Cooper VMware

Michael Rogers

CrowdStrike

Bob Skelley

Arctic Wolf

Frank Rauch

Cato Networks

Michelle Welch

WatchGuard Technologies

Lori Cornmesser

Deepwatch

Ken Marks

SentinelOne

Karl Soderlund

Palo Alto Networks

Kendra Krause

Sophos

Quickpass Cybersecurity

Jimmy Hatzell

VP, Revenue

Hatzell’s mission when he joined Quickpass was to build out the go-tomarket team. He has been hiring channel professionals and the team has grown from two to 14. Over the past 12 months, the revenue and partner base have more than tripled.

Red Hat

Stefanie Chiras

SVP, Partner Ecosystem Success Chiras drives Red Hat’s programmatic and strategic alliances, building up understanding of the value of Red Hat’s product portfolio within the partner ecosystem and defining its strategy to engage with partners to deliver customer success.

Retrospect

Werner Walter Director, Sales

Walter created a new monthly Partner Newsletter along with monthly worldwide partner sales and technical trainings for partners. He also conducted a live partner roundtable to get feedback directly from partners into product development.

Rittal

Tracy Johnson VP, IT Business Development

Johnson was focused on development of the major IT distributors and national solution providers, establishing the basics. He is focusing now more on development and alignment nationally and, in some instances, globally with these partners.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

QuoteWerks

Brian Laufer VP

Laufer worked closely with integration partners, strengthening and adding more functionality to make quoting easier, especially with distribution changes and availability. On the community front, he worked to add more virtual training and events.

Red Hat

Chris Gray VP, North America Partner Ecosystem

Under Gray’s direction, Red Hat brought five North America channel and alliance functions into one ecosystem-focused organization. In doing so, he launched a team focused on co-creating, go-to-market and business-centered partner solutions.

Reveald

Gary Benveniste

Sr. Director, Strategic Alliances

Within six months Benveniste leveraged his channel experience to quickly engage with partners and executives. This allowed him to fast-track joint selling and develop go-tomarket strategies aligned with business objectives.

Riverbed

Meg Brennan VP, Global Channel Programs, Operations Brennan replaced the partner portal, creating a new partner experience. She also launched a new rebate structure for distributors and a new specialization track that rewards partners who become specialized in SaaS solution areas.

Rapid7

Alex Page

Global VP, Channel, Alliances

Page secured agreement from Rapid7 leadership to move to a 100 percent channel business, starting with its land new business motion. He has tripled the size of the global channel organization over the past four quarters.

Red Hat

Jennifer Heard

SVP, Global Commercial Sales Heard organized a globally aligned, 100 percent partner-driven commercial business and established a new role—partner sales executive—to drive a partner-first sales strategy, resulting in higher growth margins and an increased number of partner wins.

Revelstoke

Claudia Slane Sr. Director, Alliances, Channel, Global Revelstoke launched in January 2022 and by October Slane had launched a partner program. The company is incentivizing partners with high margins to maximize the expansion of its next-level SOAR platforms in Security Operations Centers.

Riverbed

Alex Thurber SVP, Global Partners, Alliances

Upon joining Riverbed, Thurber’s immediate focus was on a census of the current partner ecosystem. He has been developing and implementing global systems integrator and MSP programs to bring Riverbed’s Aternity DEM offering to new markets.

RapidScale

Bob Buchanan EVP, Sales

Buchanan expanded the sales team, establishing new national partner manager roles to further evolve the partner program and support partners in maximizing their revenue. He also has supported cross-sell/upsell initiatives within the customer base.

Red Hat

Rob McMahon

Sr. Director, Global Software Partners McMahon enhanced the co-sell approach for global consistency, introducing new KPIs and globally consistent practices to enhance Red Hat’s co-sell program and foster cross-collaboration between partners in delivering holistic customer solutions.

Ribbon

David Hogan VP, Sales, Growth Segments Hogan has rebuilt Ribbon’s channel and enterprise strategy globally, executing this as it completed the acquisition of ECI. The company has moved from a primarily voice infrastructure provider to a UC, IP and optical infrastructure provider.

RSA

Brian Breton

VP, Channel Sales, Americas

As part of RSA’s new identityfocused strategy, Breton is executing a cloud migration campaign through partners to customers. A cross-functional effort involving the partner ecosystem has far exceeded customer outreach goals.

Raxis

Brad Herring VP,

Herring completed a comprehensive assessment of partners’ performance over the past five years, identifying those who created the most value. It was a look beyond numbers and into who these companies are and where they are headed.

Redstor

Matt Scully

Channel Chief

Redstor has become a key backup and recovery company in Europe and South Africa under Scully’s leadership. It has also now become a sought-after name in North America for MSPs that wish to provide customers with a safer backup and recovery experience.

RingCentral

Zane Long

SVP, Global Partner Sales

Long has focused on RingCentral’s partnership with Mitel, as it makes RingCentral the exclusive UCaaS provider for Mitel customers. With more than 35 million on-premises seats potentially upgrading to the cloud, he is now on-boarding Mitel partners.

SafeGuard Cyber

John McCabe

VP, Worldwide Channel Sales McCabe rolled out a 100 percent channel sales strategy that produced a 200 percent increase in deal registration over six months. He also built an MSSP program that generated over $1 million in net-new services opportunities for partners.

Channel Chief View

Eaton-Tripp Lite Partners: Prepare For More In 2023

Q. As we approach the two-year mark of the Eaton/Tripp Lite acquisition, what’s in store for 2023?

A. 2023 is the year of more more support, more products and more opportunities for our partners. As we finally begin to operate as a single entity, we’ll be anchored by an extensive channel sales and support team of more than 165 people. This includes account management teams at the distribution and large DMR levels, partner development managers supporting our channel program, specialists to recruit new partners and dedicated teams calling on system integrators and alliance partners. Additionally, it includes a strong pre-sales and solution architect team.

On the product side, we’ll be unveiling the first product lines to take advantage of the manufacturing scale of Eaton under the new Tripp Lite Series moniker. We now can serve all customer needs with the broadest portfolio in the industry, including UPSs, PDUs, rack enclosures, KVMs, power management software and multiple connectivity and peripherals product lines.

From a program perspective, our valuable Power Advantage benefits such as deal registration will be expanded to cover Tripp Lite lines, and we are excited to launch a new dedicated program for MSPs where they can earn more selling Eaton products on a transactional basis.

Q. What is your combined go-to-market strategy?

A. Having commingled the two distinct market approaches of Eaton and Tripp Lite, we’re now positioned to be the preferred partner vendor. Leveraging Tripp Lite’s push strategy at the distributor level and Eaton’s focus on reseller engagement and optimized margins has manifested into unparalleled support across the entire sales cycle—and maximized outcomes for our partners. Winning the prestigious ARC award three years in a row not only underscores our unwavering commitment to the channel but is a solid foundation to continue building great partner relationships.

Q. What does success look like with your partners?

A. First and foremost is our partners’ ability to optimize revenue, whether it be through accessing new solutions or reaping the rewards inherent in our PowerAdvantage program. Additionally, our partner success has always come from aligning our frontend sales and marketing organizations and operational support teams. When we collaborate and move as one entity across a common go-to-market strategy, we accomplish larger goals in a shorter amount of time than we ever could separately. Learn

”Eaton is the only large vendor offering a complete line of physical infrastructure, connectivity and peripheral products. This not only provides more selling opportunities to our partners but makes it easier for them to achieve their targets in our Power Advantage program.

Sage

Juha Harkonen

Harkonen unified independently operating geographyspecific partner programs under a common framework. He also realigned channel incentives and led a team to launch strategic alliances to open up market growth opportunities.

SAP America

Nanette Lazina VP, Midmarket Channels

Lazina enhanced the Partner Experience Net Promoter Score as well as the indirect sales win rate and average deal size. She also realigned partner funding to boost ROI and accountability.

ScalePad

Eric Torres VP, Channel Torres is continuing to elevate and expand ScalePad’s applications to truly deliver value to partners. Throughout the year, he will launch major enhancements to products, all based on feedback from partners, and help the company raise the bar.

Secureworks

Shawn Baker VP, Sales, Channel, North America Baker added considerable sales and support talent with channel backgrounds who fundamentally believe in and foster strong partnerships. The result was an immediate uptick in new business through the channel.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Sage Marc Monday VP, Global Strategic Partnerships, Alliances Monday has been leading the way in extending Sage’s reach via strategic alliances and scale partnerships. His team drives long-term partnerships that scale across regions and countries and deliver multiyear strategies to reach new customers.

Saviynt

Peter Rodriguez Global VP, Partner Program

Rodriguez’s leadership resulted in the Saviynt Partner Program seeing over 100 percent growth year over year and 100 percent in partner contribution, with a more extensive diversification of partners and a more significant number of partners.

ScalePad

Dan Wensley CEO Wensley leads a team that helps IT service providers sell more and service less by automating time-consuming processes for hardware, software and warranty services. He was key to helping the team expose partners to revenue-generating activities in the networks they manage.

Secureworks

Ian Bancroft CRO

The MSPs and consultants that Secureworks has partnered with to help evolve them into MSSPs have gained traction.

Bancroft provided dedicated training, support and other deliverables with the Taegis platform.

Samsung Electronics America

Jeff Gustafson Head of Mobile Channel Sales

Gustafson secured the initial sale of 740,000 Galaxy XCover Pro smartphones to Walmart, Samsung’s largest mobile enterprise deal, through partner Insight. He also spearheaded the revamp of the Ascend Partner Portal.

Scale Computing

Scott Mann Global Channel Chief

Mann brings a modern approach to channel partnerships. He has developed programs that challenge the status quo, enabling partners to seamlessly adopt and integrate modern and innovative technology into their business model.

Scality

Melissa Lyons Sr. Director, Channels, Americas Lyons created a plan to uplevel partner growth. To build more meaningful and profitable relationships, Scality needed strategic alignment with partners’ business models that would lead to increased joint pipeline and recurring revenue opportunities.

Semperis

Dave Evans VP, Global Channels, Alliances

As part of Semperis’ channel expansion, Evans led the channel launch of Forest Druid, a 100 percent partner-driven Tier 0 attack path discovery tool for Active Directory environments. He also grew channel-sourced revenue by 50 percent.

Samsung Electronics America

Chris Mertens VP, U.S. Sales

Under Mertens’ direction, Samsung has seen remarkable growth through innovative product launches such as The Wall All-In-One and Kiosk, which translate into shared success for channel partners.

ScaleFlux

Marissa Strunk Director, Channel Sales

Strunk built the channel strategy from the ground up to transition ScaleFlux from a direct selling model to a channel-first organization. She also has aligned a two-tier distribution model by recruiting TD Synnex to build a sellthrough foundation.

Schneider Electric

Shannon Sbar VP, Channels

Sbar created more efficiency with IT and alliance partners to accelerate growth for the channel. She has made significant progress with a focus on e-commerce, software and digital services, partner programs and sustainability.

SentinelOne

Chris Catanzaro

Sr. Director, North America Channel Sales Catanzaro layered in more focus on named partner accounts to strong results. The partners where he assigned strategic channel business managers have grown well over 200 percent and, in a couple of cases, over 500 percent.

SAP Karl Fahrbach Chief

Partnercentricity has become a driving force at SAP with Fahrbach’s leadership. The winning strategy to increase partner expertise to grow their business and deliver greater customer success has generated strong momentum.

ScalePad

Luis Giraldo Chief Experience Officer

Giraldo is developing a technical alliance program for vendor integration partners and integrating ScalePad’s acquisition of Backup Radar. He is also attending and speaking at major conferences and events.

ScienceLogic

Jasmina Muller VP, Global Channel Sales

Muller launched a co-sell strategy to ensure zero blocked accounts, updated the channel program to make sure partners received the support and rewards they deserved, and increased the channel funnel 3X within 120 days of joining the organization.

SentinelOne

Brian Kroneman

Sr. Director, Worldwide Channel Programs, Strategy Kroneman enhanced training and launched and then made small pivots to incentive programs. He also rolled out a tool that enables partners to see all of their accomplishments corresponding to partner tiering in one spot.

SentinelOne

Ken Marks

VP, Global Channels

Marks led a seamless integration of Attivo Networks into the SentinelOne family. He also streamlined the channel experience with an updated partner portal, increased role-based certification offerings and launched new lucrative incentives for partner reps.

Sharp Electronics

Bob Madaio VP, Marketing

M adaio communicated with Sharp’s channel by attending events, visiting partners and presenting program ideas in virtual feedback sessions. He also created a roadshow to get executives face-to-face with the community.

Siemens Digital Industries Software

Jeff Zobrist VP, Global Partner Network, Go-To-Market Zobrist spent time listening to partners and supporting their evolution to build cloud and ARR business models. This included selling threeyear SaaS agreements and building customer success practices.

SnapLogic

Jason Wakeam

VP, Business Development, Alliances, OEM Sales Wakeam steered the execution of SnapLogic’s partner strategy via its enhanced Partner Connect Program to better leverage the value partners can bring to shared customers. This resulted in an increase in channel-led growth.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

SentinelOne

Michelle Patterson Director, Field, Channel Marketing Patterson was instrumental in updating and launching channel programs and tools in support of the channel ecosystem. These included campaigns in a box, a partner portal update, Partner University and a revamp of the program overall.

Sharp Electronics

John Sheehan

SVP, B2B Channel Sales

She ehan focused on communicating and managing the changes around the Sharp and Sharp-NEC Display Solutions joint venture. He played an internal and external role in making sure the messaging was consistent.

Skuid

James Hanley VP, Global Alliances

H anley standardized on partners for joint go-to-market initiatives in the field and product management. He also developed productive working relationships with channel partner management.

Snowflake

Katie Ecklund

Sr. Director, Partner Sales, America Ecklund introduced a new regional director role that aligns to the industry sales leaders, as well as serves a firstline management team. This allowed Snowflake to grow a span of control with specific industry-focused partners.

ServiceNow

Carrie Francey VP, Strategic Global Alliances

Francey united two separate portfolios into one Strategic Global Alliance portfolio, managing change for her organization of the company’s top partners. She also oversaw over 40 CEO and C-level meetings, creating trusted 360-degree partnerships.

Sherweb

Marc-Andre Fontaine VP, Marketing

Fon taine worked closely with partners to help develop their business strategy—not just their product stack but every part of their business including operations, hiring, support, sales and marketing.

Skyhigh Security

Scott Goree VP, Worldwide Channels

While new in the role, Goree recruited and hired key talent and developed and communicated the channel strategy along with Skyhigh Security’s vision for success to the entire company.

Snowflake

Colleen Kapase

SVP, Worldwide Partners, Alliances

Under Kapase’s direction, Snowflake’s data cloud ecosystem has grown 26.5 percent to over 6,800 active customers. There are now over 590 Powered by Snowflake partners building customer-facing applications on Snowflake.

ServiceNow

David Parsons SVP, Ecosystem Ventures

Eight of the top 10 partners committed to a $1 billionplus plan under Parsons’ direction. He also industrialized ServiceNow’s Partner Development Center to provide whiteglove engagement and go-to-market enablement.

Sherweb

Jim O’Driscoll VP, Sales

W hen O’Driscoll started with Sherweb, it was supporting MSPs through Microsoft New Commerce Experience changes. He helped bring clarity to the message and built out a program designed to help ensure MSP success.

Smart Technologies

Annika Fagerstrom VP, Global Sales

Fagerstrom reinvested into selling Smart Technologies’ products to the business industry. She also revamped all resources for partners to ensure they were prepared to sell in the business market.

Snowflake

Saqib Mustafa

Global Head of Partner Marketing

Mustafa achieved milestones in Snowflake’s joint scalable marketing programs for partners. He also developed and executed on strategic joint marketing programs with the global systems integrator community and machine learning partners.

ServiceNow

Erica Volini SVP, Alliance, Channel Ecosystem Volini secured multiyear funding for partner technology and process improvements, initiated a new go-to-market motion that generated over $100 million in net-new pipeline and created transparency into the product road map for partners.

Sherweb

Michael Slater

Head of Sales, Channel Marketplace Slater advocated on behalf of partners with Sherweb’s vendors for making changes to partner programs and intervened with vendors to resolve channel conflict. He also continued to expand the company’s vendor portfolio.

Smartsheet

Steve Stewart VP, Global Channels

Stewart remained focused on driving growth in the business, from extending Smartsheet’s sales and marketing reach to expanding its professional services capabilities.

SOCSoter

Eric Pinto

Sr. Director, Channel, Product Strategy

With Pinto’s direction, SOCSoter as an organization has successfully started to shift to supporting customers from a compliance perspective and providing more value than just IT support and services.

SoftIron

Phil Crocker

VP, Business Development, Channel Crocker signed up over half of SoftIron’s partners during the last 18 months and encouraged sellers to become virtual sales directors. He also developed the Footprint for Free program, a 90-day moratorium on payment by an MSP partner building its business.

SolarWinds

Chad Reese

President, Americas Sales, Global Channel

With Reese’s direction, SolarWinds’ Transform Partner Program will drive channel growth and revolutionize the way the company interacts with partners. The program supports partners with new tools and high profit potential.

Sophos

Kendra Krause SVP, Global Channels, Sales Operations

Krause played an instrumental role in launching Sophos Managed Detection and Response, ensuring partners’ success in delivering better security outcomes. She also oversaw the creation of Partner Advisory Councils.

Sprinklr

Doug Balut SVP, Global Alliances

Balut has dramatically increased Sprinklr’s channel partner organization. He and his team drove an expansion of regional partnerships globally, focused on the six largest agency holding companies.

Software AG

Jason Johns

SVP, Global Alliances, Channel Sales With Johns’ leadership, the global partner program, PartnerConnect, gained maturity. He also drove enhanced functionality to empower partners via self-service enablement to deliver the products, solutions and services their customers need.

SonicWall

Matt Brennan VP, North America Channel Sales

Since taking on his new leadership role, Brennan has overseen North America partners delivering double-digit growth year over year. He also has launched a monthly Partner Webinar Series.

Sovos

Jonathan Eisner VP, Alliances, Chief Channel Officer

Eisner led the charge to build Sovos’ global strategy, business plan and investment case that significantly ramps up the channel as the organic growth engine. After securing a significant investment, the team quickly expanded.

Starburst Data

Toni Adams SVP, Partners, Alliances

Adams has grown the partner ecosystem with impactful partnerships such as with Accenture, Deloitte and Capgemini, and the number of partners has grown from 90 to now 220. Over 35 percent of revenue is transacted via Cloud Marketplaces.

Software AG

Matthew Marlier

VP, North American Channels, Alliances

Marlier was key to the launch of the global partner program, PartnerConnect, which represents over 400 business and technology partnerships. He also created product enablement and training for customers, partners and the developer community.

SonicWall

Jason Carter

EVP, Americas Channels, Global Installed Base Programs

Carter played a key role in three major channel go-to-market strategies: partner experience, partner voice and customer life cycle. These have all been key to SonicWall’s approach to partners.

Spectrum Partner Program

Keven Clifton VP, Strategic Sales Channels, Spectrum Business Clifton implemented a new up-front and residual commission model, giving selling partners a choice in how they earn. He also led efforts to increase the use of a coax order entry tool that creates efficiencies for partners.

StorMagic

Brian Grainger CRO, President

As executive sponsor of StorMagic’s top 10 channel partners, including OEMs, Grainger has expanded the company’s brand awareness throughout partners’ organizations. He also has built market-specific use cases and testing certifications.

SolarWinds

Zhanna Boguslavska

Global Channel Marketing Lead

The Transform Partner Program, which Boguslavska was integral in launching, is designed to evolve the way SolarWinds partners with technology distributors, VARs, global systems integrators, MSPs and cloud partners.

Sophos

Scott Barlow VP, Global MSP, Cloud Alliances

Barlow focused on launching Sophos Managed Detection and Response into the MSP Connect program. He also hired and maintained a diverse team of MSP experts with varying demographic, gender and cultural backgrounds.

Spectrum Partner Program

Michelle Kadlacek VP, Enterprise Partner Program, Spectrum Enterprise Kadlacek established managed services training sessions for her channel teams to assist partners in solution selling. She also enhanced the Spectrum Enterprise Fiber Internet Access product to support national opportunities.

StormForge

Amy Medeiros SVP, Marketing

Medeiros designed and implemented the new structure of StormForge’s partner program, standing up key partners’ landing pages and investing in and executing joint integrated marketing campaigns through collaborating with partners.

SolarWinds

Troy Dankworth

Director, North America

Channel Sales

Dankworth created a new coverage model to drive focus on high-growth partners for greater scale. He also hired experienced channel managers and developed an incentive to drive customer adoption for partners through enhanced discounting.

Sophos

Allison Clarke

Sr. Director, Global Channel Programs

A highlight for Clarke this past year was the delivery of the Sophos Managed Detection and Response service that integrates across third-party security technologies for uninhibited visibility.

Splunk

Gretchen O’Hara VP, Worldwide Channels, Alliances

O’Hara built a partner culture through simplifying tools and processes around how to sell and service customers. She also drove a sales engagement model and partner leadership in regions to be closer to the customer and market.

Stratix

Gina Daniel-Lee VP, Strategic Alliances, Partnerships

Daniel-Lee helped Stratix leverage partners to gain entry into new markets like education, health care and hospitality, resulting in 50 percent growth in new logo wins. She has also leveraged partners to expand globally.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Stripe

Dorothy Copeland

VP, Global Partner Ecosystem Copeland built and launched a comprehensive partner ecosystem, including partner training and certification. There are now over 1,200 active partners across 55 countries driving a sizable amount of revenue.

Syncro

Ian Alexander

Channel Chief

Alexander formalized participation in MSP communities and created a dedicated channel team within the company, as it was previously a shared responsibility. He also sponsored various MSP communities that are now educating the channel.

Tangoe US

Ed Pearce

VP, Sales, Global Channel Chief

Pearce took Tangoe’s philosophy from one that was channel-friendly to one that is channel-led. By partnering with Tangoe, partners can sell additional products and services such as SDWAN, cybersecurity and UCaaS.

TD Synnex

Trisha Cooke VP, Engineering, Professional Services

With her experience in transformational roles, Cooke was the Tech Data lead to represent the product and vendor management organization for the Tech Data and Synnex integration and managed the due diligence for the merger.

Stripe

Joanna Raitano Head of Go-To-Market Partners, Americas Raitano published case studies and engaged partners with go-tomarket teams to help customers more quickly realize the value of Stripe. She did this in the U.S. and opened markets in Latin America and Canada.

Synopsys

Tom Hermann VP, Global Sales, Alliances

In his second year with Synopsys, Hermann’s focus shifted from building the baseline partner program to execution and expanding the ecosystem while also deepening individual partnerships. He also more than tripled the size of the partner organization.

Tanium

Frank DeCicco RVP, Partner Sales, Americas

DeCicco’s identification of and investment in growth drivers across various partner types—global systems integrators, MSPs, national and regional integrators, and the cloud ecosystem—was key to Tanium’s growth.

TD Synnex

Francisco Criado SVP, Cloud, Data, IoT

Criado developed consulting engagements ensuring partners maximize the market opportunity of evolving vendor programs.

A recent example is the Digital Practice Builder for the new Microsoft Cloud Partner Program.

Sumo Logic

Timm Hoyt SVP, Global Partners, Alliances

Hoyt orchestrated a pivot in Sumo Logic’s goto-market into a partner-first sales motion. This was achieved through a strong company commitment to accelerating customer success by working closely with the partner ecosystem.

Syspro

Michael Bennett Group Channel Executive

Syspro’s relationship with the channel has matured as Bennett led the way from the company being mostly focused on product to one that has business success for customers, channel partners and Syspro as primary objectives.

Tanium

Todd Palmer SVP, Global Partner Sales

Palmer simplified product, pricing, packaging and partner profitability and evangelized a partner-first mentality and sales model within Tanium’s global distribution team. He also accelerated the growth of partner services.

TD Synnex

Brian Davis SVP, Operations, North America

The merger of Tech Data and Synnex to become TD Synnex was a major accomplishment for Davis from an operations perspective. He aligned a new combined team to cover logistics, inventory management and more.

SUSE

Rachel Cassidy

SVP, Global Channel, Alliances Cassidy evolved partner program offerings to invest in the partner ecosystem. She also improved enablement offerings to support partners in not only selling, but putting together a solution, delivering it and supporting mutual customers.

Syxsense

Jose Rangel VP, Global Channels

Rangel worked on adding new marquee U.K. partners to extend Syxsense’s reach overseas. He also has ramped up the team and added two field channel managers, a field channel marketing team member and a new director of channel marketing.

Tanium

Ian Williamson VP, Global MSP Sales

Williamson joined Tanium to build a global MSP program, staff a sales organization focused on MSP partners and execute a growth strategy that will far exceed that of its overall growth rate. In two years, he has achieved his goals.

TD Synnex

Eddie Franklin SVP, Public Sector, Sales

As the TD Synnex integration kicked off, Franklin began planning to form one TD Synnex public sector business. He collaborated with multiple leaders and navigated several transitions to find a path forward.

Synack

Tracy Pallas VP, Worldwide Channels, Alliances Pallas focused the channel team on a targeted number of investment partners per region, which increased deal registration by 21 percent. She also accelerated Synack’s strategic alliance with Microsoft by aligning to three internal sales plays.

Talkdesk

Chad Haydar

Global VP, Channels, Alliances

Haydar introduced a flexible partner program that makes it easy for any partner to engage with Talkdesk, regardless of their go-tomarket approach. Partners are widely embracing the program.

TD Synnex

Shawn Ardiel VP, Product Management, Business Development, Secure Networking

During the merger of Tech Data and Synnex into TD Synnex, Ardiel’s team led the migration to the unified ERP system. The team set an aggressive goal to complete the move and achieved it.

TD Synnex

Reza Honarmand SVP, Global Cloud, Hyperscalers Honarmand prioritized technology enrichment and championed investment in a high-growth skills team to address the skills gap. He has developed specialized learning paths for colleagues to become technology practitioners.

TD Synnex

Steven Jow EVP, Sales

Jow merged two large heritage sales teams in Tech Data and Synnex with little disruption to the ecosystem of solution providers and vendors, maximizing the benefits and go-tomarket strategies of each team.

TD Synnex

Joe Pittillo SVP, North America, Services, Engineering Pittillo led the integration of the legacy Synnex and Tech Data engineering and services teams, bringing an expanded set of solutions to the channel that enabled greater services to VARs and extended their geographical, vertical and capacity reach.

TD Synnex

Jessica Yeck VP, Americas, Global Lead, NetApp, Veeam, Oracle Enterprise Yeck led her team through the merger integration. As chair of Elevate, focused on recruiting, retaining and advancing women in IT, she doubled the board to bring in colleagues from the legacy organization to amplify DEI efforts.

Tenable

Greg Goetz

Sr. Director, Global Strategic Partners, MSSPs Goetz led a significant global expansion of the Tenable MSSP program and team, working with MSSP partners in over 50 countries servicing customers from SMB all the way up to Global 2000 customers.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

TD Synnex

Tom Mahoney VP, Marketing, Public Sector Mahoney led rebranding initiatives to communicate the total TD Synnex value proposition to channel partners and resellers seeking to grow their U.S. public sector business. These make it easier for resellers to leverage the full value stack.

TD Synnex

Sandi Stambaugh SVP, Product Management

Stambaugh delivered above-market growth and expansion of market share through the development and expansion of relevant value-added services and support activities. She also integrated the TD Synnex visual solutions practice post-close of the merger.

Tehama

Mick Miralis VP, Worldwide Channels

Miralis educated and influenced the senior management team to shift Tehama’s overall go-to-market strategy from a largely direct model to indirect. This has included the reallocation of resources, marketing and budget globally.

Tenable

Trevor Henney

Sr. Director, Channel Strategy, Programs, Operations Tenable acquired a few companies over the past year, and Henney was involved in making sure they were integrated into the company’s 100 percent channel-led business. He also made sure any partner they previously worked with was on-boarded.

TD Synnex

Marc McClure SVP, Enterprise, Midmarket Sales

McClure led the global integration of the sales and marketing functions as Tech Data and Synnex were combined into one brand. He has provided solution providers and vendors with comprehensive coverage and support.

TD Synnex

Bob Stegner SVP, Marketing, North America

The new hybrid era led Stegner to continue expanding TD Synnex’s virtual capabilities as face-to-face meetings declined. Innovative technologies have allowed the distributor to remain in constant contact with customers and end users.

Tenable

Chris Blando

Sr. Director, Channel Sales, Americas

Blando held an in-person Partner Advisory Board meeting with key executives from top partners for the first time since COVID. The entire C-suite of executives had the opportunity to share Tenable’s direction and vision with partners.

Think On

Greg Chappell

VP, Global Sales, Partner Success

Chappell deployed teams focused on key Think On partners or a defined portfolio of partners. Each team helps partners win new business and ensure the successful adoption and retention of services.

TD Synnex

Jessica McDowell VP, Security, Networking

McDowell led a team that continued to set the bar in the distribution channel for delivering and executing strategic business plans tied not only to vendor-specific initiatives but also to industry and market trends.

TD Synnex

Reyna Thompson SVP, Vendor Management, Security, Public Sector Thompson signed 55 cybersecurity vendors, launched partner enablement and sales development programs, expanded services offerings and built a social selling enablement and training program.

Tenable

Jeff Brooks

VP, Global Channels, Business Development

Brooks continued Tenable’s digital marketplace strategy, modernizing routes to market via both cloud-native and distributor marketplaces as customer and partner buying patterns morph.

ThreatQuotient

Haig Colter

Director, Alliances

To make it as easy as possible to work with ThreatQuotient, Colter streamlined some agreements to be more flexible. MSSPs need flexibility and options to buy product, retain title and use that software as part of their managed offerings.

TD Synnex

Stacy Nethercoat SVP, Advanced Solutions, High Growth Technologies Nethercoat created the foundation for Advanced Solutions at TD Synnex to grow. It rests on three pillars: digitally transform the channel, mine data to create new value and optimize existing ones, and expand the community.

TD Synnex

Mike Ward VP, Cloud Solutions, Americas Ward led the team to the signing of a multiyear Strategic Collaboration Agreement with AWS, which launched new and innovative solution offerings around financial operations for solutions and an AWS Migration assistance program.

Tenable

Terry Dolce

EVP, Global Business Development, Channels, Specialist Sales Dolce began leveraging Tenable’s distributor portal route to market to automate and offload smaller transactions to free up reps to focus on their larger opportunities. It’s an effort to scale up by leveraging the power of the channel.

Thrive

Rick Ribas

Channel Chief Ribas is hard at work to improve the partner experience. That has included building a partner portal, creating a partner lead program, focusing on the best of the best in the industry and taking a partner-first mentality.

Channel Chief View

Aruba Invests Further To Benefit Partners

Q.. What is your channel philosophy?

A. I firmly believe in the value that a strong partner go-to-market model can bring to accelerate a company’s business growth and market coverage. Building close partnerships based on trust, solid business principles and mutually beneficial goals drives success. Aruba’s business is 95 percent through the channel and we attribute that to having tremendous alignment between our field sales team and partners.

Q. What are the biggest opportunities for your partners in 2023?

A. 2023 offers several big opportunities for partners. Since acquiring Silver Peak in 2020, we have seen a tremendous amount of success with our Aruba EdgeConnect SD-WAN platform. A secure SD-WAN is the foundational component for architecting a secure access service edge (SASE), powering branch, WAN and security.

Traditional data centers were built with siloed infrastructure layers, purpose-built hardware and fragmented management—resulting in complex deployment models and operations. With our unique data center AMD/Pensando-based solution, customers benefit from automated IT operations, accelerated service delivery and a cloud-like operational experience. Additionally, with the HPE GreenLake edge-tocloud offering, nearly all our solutions are available under the platform—giving our partners a strong position to deliver a comprehensive as-a-service offering.

Q.. Where should channel partners invest in 2023?

A. Partners should invest in three key areas. First, they should explore expanding their business to include as-a-service offerings. This is an area where we can help guide them as they make the transition. Second, partners should invest in selling business outcomes, rather than simply selling technology at a competitive price. Today, partners must understand customers’ key business and technical challenges and enable them to achieve their goals by giving them expert guidance, innovative technologies and flexible consumption models. And finally, partners should expand their AI expertise and offerings in 2023. As more organizations adopt AI tools to boost efficiency, they’re also experiencing IT breakthroughs.

Q.Q. How will your 2022 key investments payoff in 2023?

A. In 2022 we made substantial investments in our managed services partners that we expect to lead to more partners adopting our networking-as-a-service (NaaS) portfolio. We also put together a comprehensive training program from the sales and technical support perspectives on leveraging Aruba ESP that will drive business, including as-a-service offerings. In addition, our new HPE Partner Ready Vantage program and unique Partner Ambassador program will both deliver valuable benefits for our partners.

https://www.arubanetworks.com/partners/channel-partners/

”We give our partners a unique edge over our competition within the data center market. Traditional data centers were built with siloed infrastructure layers, purpose-built hardware and fragmented management. With our data center solution, customers can benefit from automated IT operations, accelerated service delivery and a cloud-like operational experience.

TierPoint

Kenny Ash

VP, Channel Sales

Ash rolled out new and innovative product offerings that will support and accelerate the business results of channel partners. He has expanded training for partners and internal sales teams to help them jointly identify opportunities.

TruNorth Dynamics

Curtis Cullison

VP, Channel

Cullison led the way as TruNorth Dynamics made a decision to be 100 percent channel-focused on MSPs. The company is making it easier for them to offer Microsoft Dynamics to their customers, and to date it has over 170 partners.

Vault America

Zak Karsan CEO

Karsan has been laserfocused on positioning Vault America’s cyber and data security offerings around compliance to help partners penetrate new markets. The result has been new partner customer acquisition and revenue.

Veeam Software

Kevin Rooney

VP, Americas Channel Sales

Rooney remains focused on the customer life-cycle experience and guiding partners from implementation to execution and beyond, ensuring Veeam’s technology services solve businesses’ problems.

TPx

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Trellix

Trellix

Trend Micro

Stacy

The channel was below plan when Conrad took her new role. In less than 10 months, she hired two sales directors, relaunched the national program and created an inside channel team. TPx exceeded its numbers every month in 2022.

Trustifi

Rom Hendler

Co-Founder, CEO

Hendler works closely with the team to improve Trustifi’s offerings, addressing ongoing threats as malicious actors and their tactics evolve. He has added new capabilities and options to make it easier for partners and end users to attain superior protection.

Vectra AI

Randy Schirman Channel Chief, Worldwide VP, Partnerships Schirman created and institutionalized a global referral program and launched multinational partner depot policy programs. He also led Vectra AI through a partner portal migration and drove updated partner enablement content and certification processes.

Veracode

Jacques Lopez

Sr. Director, North America Channels

Lopez redesigned the North American channel team to better accommodate a regional co-selling channel strategy with partners. He also led a revamped on-boarding strategy for all new partners based on the partner type.

Guran Green Head of Americas Channels, Distribution Green supported the integration efforts of bringing two teams (FireEye and McAfee) together, as well as partner ecosystems, partner programs and cultures. He worked to cast a vision, supported by detailed operational plans, to unify the organization.

UiPath

Jay Snyder

SVP, Global Head of Customers, Partners Snyder centralized four partner organizations into one global function. He also reimagined an organization and operating model to drive internal and external effectiveness with partners and led the creation of an upcoming new partner program, Partner Next.

Vectra AI

Bonnie Simmons VP, Partner Sales, Americas Simmons recruited and rebuilt a channel sales team in tandem with creating a netnew Focus Partner strategy for the Americas. Vectra AI has seen a 200 percent increase in partner-driven revenue and 120 percent pipeline growth from fiscal year 2021.

Veriff

Manuel Solis III

Head of Global Partnerships, Alliances

When Solis joined Veriff, the company lacked experience in building a comprehensive channel program. He has since launched the company’s inaugural partner program, R.E.V.—Revenue Expansion with Veriff— which is already seeing significant growth.

Britt Norwood SVP, Global Channels, Commercial Norwood led the merger of two distinct channel organizations into a unified team. To ensure a consistent channel-first strategy, he reorganized the go-to-market strategy and rethought the partner program to ensure it was designed with partners in mind.

Unitrends

Adam Larrabee

VP, Sales, Channel

Larrabee increased the investment in Unitrends’ partner enablement and on-boarding programs. This investment has significantly increased the number of partners transacting its products.

Veeam Software

Larissa Crandall

VP, Global Channel, Alliances

Crandall is pulling together the company’s channel and alliances into one connected global ecosystem team and motion. This will enhance the partner experience and support partners and customers across the entire life cycle.

Verint Systems

John Bourne SVP, Global Channels, Alliances

Bourne defined the elements of a new SaaS program and hired a new partner program team and a global systems integrator management team as Verint increases the partner ecosystem to include more SaaS service delivery and consulting partners.

Louise McEvoy VP, U.S. Channel

Trend Micro’s channel team has grown because customers’ need for the channel has grown. McEvoy expanded t he company’s new channel cloud-forward team and promoted some key individuals to leadership roles.

Unstoppable Domains

Sandy Carter SVP, Channel Chief Carter drives new partnerships through her personal relationships, credibility and go-to-market creativity that helped one partner increase new customers by 30 percent. She has grown strategic partnerships from 61 to over 560.

Veeam Software

Matt Kalmenson

VP, Cloud, Services Providers, Americas

In addition to running a channel organization with service providers, Kalmenson runs an end-user-facing sales team. He has been focused on merging both teams to ensure the end-user sales team knows the value of every route to market.

Veritas Technologies

Jay McGloin

VP, Americas Partner Sales, Alliances

McGloin’s priority was to grow new and renew business, providing pathways for partners to attach new business. He is also focused on improving partner enablement to help partners leverage the portfolio, attach services and drive better outcomes.

Veritas Technologies

Mike Walkey

SVP, Global Channels, Alliances

Walkey was key to Veritas’ transition from a perpetual licensing model to a subscription model, delivering more predictability for partners around recurring revenue streams and more flexible customer buying options.

ViewSonic

Deidre Deacon

GM, Channel Chief

With a partner-first approach, Deacon navigated the ever-changing and fluid visual solutions market. She expanded the number of channel partners and breadth of products that they had access to.

VMware

Tara Fine VP, Americas Partner Organization Fine has invested in evolving organizationally to ensure her team feels valued, included and engaged. She has empowered the team to use their voice because gathering input from diverse perspectives is critical for maximizing opportunities.

WatchGuard

Adam Otis

Sr. Manager, Channel Programs, Operations Otis has grown his team, trained new partner program team staff and seen them contribute collaboratively and independently. Being able to utilize different skill sets and perspectives allows the team to execute better.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

Verizon Business

Wendy Taccetta

Channel Chief Taccetta served as the executive sponsor of a new channel program focused on doorto-door agents that have helped drive 5G Business Internet sales. The program has leveraged C-Band network investments that have increased 5G availability in 99 markets.

ViewSonic

Ryan Strayer Sr. Director, Sales, Channel Chief ViewSonic continued to maintain clean channel pricing under Strayer’s direction and worked to keep wellbalanced inventory that allowed it to fulfill orders and not overstock the channel.

Wasabi Technologies

Clark Brown VP, North America Channels

Wasabi’s channel team has increased significantly in size and expanded globally under Brown. Wasabi has signed its first global distribution partner and established its first global business development team.

WatchGuard

Sean Price SVP, Worldwide Sales Price led the execution of integrating the company’s Panda acquisition into its two-tier distribution model. He was instrumental in developing and rolling out regionaland country-specific plans to support accessibility and adoption of all products now available.

Verkada

Caleb Augustin

Head of Channel Sales

Augustin created and fostered growth in Verkada’s channel employees and partner relationships. Under his leadership, Verkada has doubled its channel employee head count, creating three new roles to provide a better partner experience.

VIPRE Security Group

Marc Malafronte Director, Channel

Malafronte launched a new partner program, revamped the partner portal and doubled the channel sales team, restructuring it regionally to better assist partners. He also opened VIPRE ’s entire portfolio to partners.

Wasabi Technologies

Marty Falaro EVP, COO

Falaro added enablement resources, presales teams and vertical sales specialists. The go-to-market strategy is evolving to include additional channel investment in people, programs and MDF to ensure consistent growth.

WatchGuard

Mark Romano

Sr. Director, Channel Engagement, Performance Romano adjusted business models, allowing partners to preserve financial power while providing better terms to customers. He extended co-op fund use, providing a longerterm outbound marketing solution.

Vertiv

Peter Klanian SVP, North America Sales

Klanian ensured that Vertiv has kept a consistent channel philosophy, and it is showing strong business results. Vertiv’s channel growth has outpaced the market over the past two years and market-share gains are evidence that the strategy is working.

Virtana

Bob Kilbride Worldwide VP, Channel Sales, Alliances

Kilbride changed the channel organization from being regionally focused to being partner focused. Virtana now has assigned partner managers for each partner as it moves from a transactional to relational approach.

Wasabi Technologies

Mark Vella VP, Global Business Development

Vella spearheaded the launch of Wasabi’s official OEM program while helping expand the overall channel program on a global scale. He hired a global team to facilitate OEM business and educated them on its long-term value.

WatchGuard

Joseph Tavano

Channel Marketing Specialist

Tavano consolidated partner communications with a partner-first strategy in mind. He also developed a worldwide enablement content strategy and launched a new marketing enablement and automation platform.

Viakoo

Frank Rubio VP, Channels, Alliances

Rubio increased channel revenue from 45 percent to 68 percent of overall sales. He also implemented a refined go-to-market strategy related to the channel and created a “Campaign in a Box” program for premier partners.

VMware

Ricky Cooper VP, Head of Worldwide Partner, Commercial Organization

Cooper was key to the launch of the next evolution of VMware’s partner program, Partner Connect. VMware now has a singular partner program that includes multiple business models and routes to market.

WatchGuard

Sean Banahan Director, U.S. Channel Sales Banahan has overseen the evolution of WatchGuard’s inside sales team into a true channel sales team over the past four years. WatchGuard’s U.S. channel sales team supports a set of assigned resellers.

WatchGuard

Hillary Taylor-Hartle Manager, Partner Development

In her first year as a manager for the partner development team, Taylor-Hartle has on-boarded a new MSP franchise, helped improve reporting for partner recruitment activities and developed special promotions targeting new partner segments.

WatchGuard

Chris Wachel

Regional VP, Sales, U.S., Canada

Wachel coordinated the efforts between channel account managers, sales engineers and others toward the goal of achieving sales quotas. He also led strategic planning sessions to achieve sales and cross-selling targets.

WSO2

Greg Stuecklin VP, GM, North America Sales

With Nutanix, WSO2 has penetrated a large portion of educational institutions as well as health-care and other industries where it previously had limited reach. With Stuecklin’s direction, success will lie in higher-margin wins for partners.

ZeroFox

Brian Costello VP, Global Channel, Public Sector Sales

Costello has driven partner participation to increase from 35 percent to 46 percent. He also accelerated partner adoption and playbooks internally to better service partners and increase market share.

Rewst

Charlie Tomeo CRO

Tomeo has just joined Rewst, where he will lead the development, strategy and execution of sales. He leverages an innovative approach to the channel through a network of partners and MSPs with a keen focus on being easy to do business with.

2023 CHANNEL CHIEFS

WatchGuard

Michelle Welch CMO

Welch oversaw the expansion and modernization of WatchGuard’s approach to cooperative and vendorled demand generation activities, including the integration and rollout of buying-intent technology for WatchGuard and its partners.

Xcitium

Michael Costantino VP, Strategic Partnerships

Constantino built out a channel program at Xcitium in under eight months, including staffing, marketing, enablement and execution. He is responsible for most of the key strategic partners on-boarded over this time.

Zerto

Eric Barnhart VP, Global Cloud, Channel Sales

Barnhart established a Partner Advisory Board and launched bi-directional communication to improve effectiveness. He also improved field seller engagement with the MSP community and implemented a deal registration plan for enterprise sellers.

Workday

Since joining Workday in April 2022, Alkharrat has spearheaded a new vision for the partner ecosystem. This vision will enable faster time to value for customers across industries and create greater collaboration and alignment.

Xerox

Karl Boissonneault Leader, North America Channels

Xerox created teams focused on both the customer and the partner experience under Boissonneault’s leadership. He adjusted programs to protect partners against supply chain constraints and launched a new North American channel organization.

Zoom Video Communications

Todd Surdey Head of Global Channels, Business Development Surdey launched the Zoom Up Partner Program that makes it simple for partners to outline their path and growth with Zoom, which serves a network of thousands of partners in over 150 countries and territories.

WorkFusion

Os Haque SVP, Head of Global Channels, Alliances

The channel program was dissolved two years before Haque joined WorkFusion. He focused on “turning the ship” and convinced partners that the future couldn’t be successful without them and he was investing in them to join the journey.

Zebra Technologies

Bill Cate VP, Global Channels, Alliances

Cate built a channel development strategy focused on designing new routes to market for new acquisitions—fixed-industrial scanning, machine vision, robotics, task and workforce management software—as well as new organic technologies.

Zscaler

Todd Meister SVP, Global Partners, Alliances

Meister helped introduce new elements to Zscaler’s fiscal year 2023 internal policy and partner program to increase partner profitability and also enhanced discounts for sourced and teaming deal registrations.

Wrike Archie Sharma VP, Partnerships, Business, Corporate Development Sharma

grew channel sales by 42 percent year over year. He also built a partnership team, a highvelocity recruitment and enablement engine and a solutions partners program where partners are able to OEM Wrike into their platforms with minimal effort.

Zendesk

Peter Lorant

Global SVP, Partner, Channel Sales Lorant pivoted the channel sales team to a new primary metric around partners sourcing incremental revenue. When partners source opportunities, Zendesk has seen an increase in both average deal size as well as average win rate.

Zyxel Networks

David Soares EVP, Channel Sales, Marketing, North America

Soares increased the number of Zyxel active partners year on year. He also increased sales despite cost increases and shortages and drove significant growth in cloud services.

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Vendors Step Up As Hackers Get Stealthier

While cybersecurity has always been complex, the need to choose from a vast array of security vendors only adds to the challenge. To help solution providers navigate the industry, the CRN Security 100 highlights channel-friendly cybersecurity vendors across a number of market segments, including Endpoint and Managed Security, Identity Management and Data Protection, Network Security, Security Operations, Risk and Threat Intelligence, and Web, Email and Application Security.

Our list includes companies old and new, ranging from the largest and best-known players to some of the small-but-promising startups. Key themes include a growing focus on helping to secure organizations in a perimeter-less world in which workforces continue to be distributed, the attack surface is expanding and hackers are finding new ways to exploit the situation. Offerings focused on enabling a zero trust security posture, leveraging cloudnative technologies and providing more comprehensive detection capabilities are among those being featured prominently on our Security 100 list for 2023.

Without a doubt, security tools focused on prevention are not enough today, said Rocco Galletto, a partner and national cybersecurity leader at solution provider BDO Canada in Toronto.

While prevention is still important, businesses also need to think about how to achieve “cyber resilience”—recognizing that breaches are inevitable and that the key now is “to ensure that we respond, remediate and recover as quickly as possible to limit the damage,” Galletto said. Ultimately, “the days of monitoring that one firewall or that one choke point for the organization—those days are gone.”

When it comes to zero trust, the effort to offer products that enable a zero trust posture—which can involve deploying steeper requirements for user access to data and giving greater control to organizations—is now essentially an industrywide initiative.

Within Endpoint and Managed Security, among the vendors CRN is highlighting is Austin, Texas-based CrowdStrike, which recently unveiled its Falcon Insight XDR offering. The platform enables the company’s endpoint detection and response customers to “easily activate XDR capabilities” to bring together telemetry from both CrowdStrike and third-party security tools, empowering security analysts to create “a detailed storyline on how an attack develops and progresses.”

Within Identity Management and Data Protection, one key vendor on the list this year is Austin-based SailPoint, which recently updated its Identity Security Cloud platform. The enhancements use AI to accelerate the measurement of risk around user access and bring greater automation to critical processes.

In Network Security, among the vendors on the list is Santa Clara, Calif.-based Palo Alto Networks, which recently released its PANOS 11.0 Nova software update. Among the more than 50 updates in the product is a new service, Advanced WildFire, which adds enhanced mitigations for attacks involving evasive malware.

Within Security Operations, Risk and Threat Intelligence, CRN is highlighting Mountain View, Calif.-based Google Cloud, which has been making a big bet on cybersecurity with the major acquisitions last year of Mandiant and Siemplify. Their technologies have been utilized in the recent launch of Chronicle Security Operations, a cloud-native alternative to traditional security information and event management tools that are often run by security teams in on-premises environments.

In Web, Email and Application Security, among those on this list is Boston-based Snyk, which offers developer-focused security tools that aim to make it easier to fix code security issues early in the software development process.

Following is the full list of vendors with details on key product offerings.

ENDPOINT AND MANAGED SECURITY VENDORS

Amid an intensifying cyberthreat environment, the ability to detect malicious activity across endpoints and other IT environments is now table stakes for most businesses. From vendors providing endpoint detection and response tools to companies o ering managed detection and response services, here’s a look at key endpoint and managed security companies.

Bitdefender

Recent product updates from Bitdefender include the introduction of GravityZone Integrity Monitoring, aimed at monitoring and correcting unwanted changes to data. Sources of data the o ering helps to maintain include files, installed apps, registries and directories, as well as unwanted escalation of user privileges.

ESET

Richard Marko

CEO

ESET has made a number of updates recently to its products, including the launch of extended detection and response offerings for MSPs. The offerings aim to provide MSPs with a simplified and centralized platform that’s optimized for their unique needs.

OpenText

Cybersecurity

Mark Barrenechea

Vice Chair, CEO, CTO Information management technology company

OpenText

o ers numerous cybersecurity products within its sizable portfolio. As part of its ”security cloud,” OpenText provides extended detection and response, data management, threat intelligence, digital investigations and information assurance.

BlackBerry John

Executive Chairman, CEO

BlackBerry recently unveiled its zero trust network access tool called CylanceGatewayto provide users with a contextual correlation of network and device telemetry with continuous authentication to limit access to trusted, authenticated and known users and devices.

Expel

Dave Merkel Co-Founder, CEO

Expel offers a 24/7 managed detection and response service across cloud, SaaS, networks and endpoints. It includes detection, rapid investigation and response, remediation and proactive threat hunting. Recent enhancements include accelerated phishing remediation to minimize the chances of a compromise.

Opswat

Benny Czarny Founder, Chairman, CEO

With a focus on providing security offerings for critical infrastructure providers, Opswat’s recent moves have included the acquisition of Bayshore Networks to extend critical infrastructure protection capabilities to operational technology and industrial control system environments.

CrowdStrike

George Kurtz

Co-Founder, President, CEO

While continuing to enhance its cloud-native Falcon endpoint detection and response platform, CrowdStrike has been doubling down on numerous other categories including identity protection and cloud security. Other recent product moves have included the introduction of Falcon LogScale for improved observability.

Huntress

Kyle Hanslovan Co-Founder, CEO

Huntress provides a managed security platform aimed at SMBs and has added features including external port monitoring, a managed antivirus offering and host isolation functionality. The company also recently said it was adding new managed endpoint detection and response capabilities.

Cynet

Eyal

Co-Founder, CEO

Cynet offers an end-toend, natively automated extended detection and response platform backed by a 24/7 managed detection and response service. The Cynet 360 AutoXDR platform brings together detection, prevention, correlation, investigation and response across endpoints, users, networks and SaaS applications.

Kaspersky

Eugene Kaspersky Co-Founder, CEO

Kaspersky in June said that it was opening three new “transparency centers” around the globe where qualified personnel can review the company’s coding, software updates, threat detection rules and other engineering and data processing practices.

Deep Instinct Lane Bess

Co-Founder, CEO

Deep Instinct says its technology can predict attacks prior to their occurrence, including for previously unseen attacks, thanks to its deep-learning algorithm that seeks to replicate the workings of a human brain. Recent moves included the debut of Deep Instinct Prevention for Applications, an agentless solution for preventing malware attacks.

Malwarebytes

Marcin Kleczynski Co-Founder, CEO

Malwarebytes provides antivirus, endpoint and other security products and services and said in September that it is looking to massively expand its MSP partnership program. The moves are meant to increase the number of the company’s global MSP partners to 10,000 within the next few years, up from 2,700 in September.

SentinelOne

Tomer Weingarten

Co-Founder, CEO

A key player in endpoint detection and response with its AI-powered Singularity platform, SentinelOne’s recent moves have included the acquisition of Attivo Networks to target identity threat detection and response. It has also leveraged its Scalyr acquisition to launch capabilities for correlation of security data.

Sophos

Kris Hagerman CEO

Sophos debuted what it calls the first “agnostic” managed detection and response service that integrates telemetry from CrowdStrike, Microsoft, SentinelOne and others.

It also launched Sophos Marketplace, which it described as an “open ecosystem” of numerous technology integrations.

Tanium

Dan Streetman CEO

Tanium has launched a new category that it has dubbed ”converged endpoint management,” or ”XEM.” The offering integrates security and risk capabilities along with those of IT and operations, providing a centralized set of controls.

CRN SECURITY 100

ThreatLocker

ThreatLocker aims to improve enterpriselevel server and endpoint security by blocking exploits of unknown application vulnerabilities through application whitelisting, ringfencing, storage control, privileged access management and network access control o erings.

Trellix

Formed through the merger of McAfee Enterprise and FireEye, Trellix has brought a focus on securing customers with its extended detection and response platform. The platform supports ingestion and correlation of data from hundreds of third-party tools in addition to the company’s own native security tools.

Trend Micro

Eva Chen Co-Founder, CEO

Trend Micro recently unveiled Trend Micro One, a unified cybersecurity platform aimed at making it easier for partners and customers to view and assess their attack surfaces and risk postures. The platform can pull data from thirdparty products to enhance customers’ view of potential threats.

VMware

In addition to its Carbon Black endpoint security o ering, VMware provides products for modernizing Security Operations Centers, multi-cloud workload security and application security. The company recently launched VMware Contexa, which is a cloud-delivered threat intelligence o ering.

Zimperium

Shridhar Mittal CEO

Mobile security specialist

Zimperium’s zIPS mobile endpoint security o ering aims to detect threats across device, network, phishing and application attacks. The o ering works across both Apple iOS and Android devices.

IDENTITY MANAGEMENT AND DATA PROTECTION VENDORS

With so many workers now outside the corporate firewall, hackers have increasingly been targeting identity credentials as the means to access a company‘s sensitive data. From vendors o ering robust identity security capabilities to those focused on securing the data itself, here’s a look at 20 identity management and data protection companies.

Acronis

Patrick Pulvermueller CEO

Acronis recently introduced its Advanced Data Loss Prevention pack for the Acronis Cyber Protect Cloud platform. Notably, the o ering aims to help MSPs protect their customers from the threat of data leakage.

CyberArk

Udi Mokady

Founder, Chairman, CEO

Within the portfolio of privileged access and identity security company CyberArk, notable products include its Identity Secure Web Sessions offering. The product records, audits and protects end-user activity within designated web applications, providing e icient identification of anomalous activity and enabling investigation.

BeyondTrust

Janine Seebeck Board Member, CEO

Privileged access management specialist BeyondTrust brings together privileged password management, endpoint privilege management and secure remote access into a unified platform o ering centralized management as well as reporting and analytics.

Dell Security

Michael Dell

Founder, Chairman, CEO

Dell recently launched Dell PowerProtect

Cyber Recovery for Microsoft Azure, which allows organizations to deploy an isolated cyber vault in Azure to protect against ransomware attacks, as well as Dell Apex Cyber Recovery Services, which aim to simplify recovery from cyberattacks.

BigID

Dimitri Sirota Co-Founder, CEO

BigID has enhanced its privacy and data protection platform with new features designed to reduce vulnerabilities that could pose a security threat. The company said it is offering an “industry first” with the launch of automatic remediation around management of access and permissions on overexposed data and over-privileged users.

ForgeRock

Fran Rosch CEO

The ForgeRock Identity Platform provides identity and access management security capabilities in on-premises and multi-cloud environments, as well as in hybrid scenarios for workers, customers, workflows and devices. The platform aims to deliver zero trust security and protect against account takeover and fraud.

Broadcom Software

Hock Tan

President, CEO

Broadcom o ers identity and access management capabilities via its acquisition of Symantec, including verification of user and device access requests and enforcement of least privileged access. It also provides automation for user provisioning and access governance as well as privileged access management.

Fortra

Kate Bolseth CEO

Fortra, which changed its name from HelpSystems in November, has a number of data protection offerings that leverage technology from several of the company’s acquisitions, including that of Digital Guardian. Offerings include data classification, data loss prevention and digital rights management.

Code42

Joe Payne

President, CEO

Code42’s security product portfolio includes the Incydr data protection offering, which enables security teams to detect, investigate and respond to insider threats. Features include identification of data exposure, prioritization of risks and forensic search capabilities.

Immuta

With a focus on enabling data security and privacy, Immuta o ers capabilities including centralized data access control, cloud data discovery and classification, and consistent data privacy controls. The offerings aim to provide greater automation of controls for data access and privacy within cloudbased data platforms.

NEW FOR 2023 CRN INTRODUCES THE INCLUSIVE CHANNEL LEADERS AWARD

The Inclusive Channel Leaders award shines light on people within the channel striving to create a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace. Nominate yourself or others who are working for a more inclusive and diverse channel.

Microsoft

Microsoft‘s focus within the realm of identity management is on its Entra product family, which launched last year and includes its widely used Azure Active Directory identity service as well as cloud infrastructure entitlement management and decentralized identity o erings.

SailPoint Technologies

Mark McClain

Founder, CEO

SailPoint has been branching out beyond its roots in identity governance and administration to add cloud access management, password management, access risk management and more. New capabilities have included AI-driven automated discovery and remediation for anomalous identities and high-risk user access permissions.

Okta

Okta has been working to build out its portfolio beyond its flagship identity and access management lineup, including with the recent introduction of Okta Identity Governance and the forthcoming launch of Okta Privileged Access. The company is integrating them as a unified o ering, the Okta Workforce Identity Cloud.

Saviynt

Sachin Nayyar

Founder, Chairman, CEO

Offering what it calls a “converged identity platform,” Saviynt is focused on governance of employee access to business resources—ultimately aiming to improve the control that a partner or customer has over identity access across both cloud and on-premises environments.

OneTrust

Kabir Barday

Founder, CEO

OneTrust’s cloud-based platform unites a number of products in the realm of data security and privacy. Those include data governance capabilities such as data discovery and cataloging as well as privacy management, governance and policy management, third-party risk management and compliance management.

Semperis

Mickey Bresman

Co-Founder, CEO

Semperis provides products that seek to prevent malicious access to Microsoft Active Directory and Azure Active Directory. Key features include the ability to spot changes to AD and Azure AD that would bypass security logs and then automatically remediate any changes deemed malicious.

20 NETWORK SECURITY VENDORS

Ping Identity

Andre Durand

Founder, CEO

With its PingOne for Workforce o ering, Ping Identity provides an authentication hub that is centrally managed and can serve as the basis for a zero trust strategy. Key capabilities include no-code identity orchestration, single signon for all apps, adaptive multifactor authentication and centralized access security.

Skyhigh Security

Gee Rittenhouse CEO

Skyhigh Security, formerly the McAfee Enterprise security service edge business, offers a datadriven approach to cloud data loss prevention as well as secure web gateway, zero trust network access, cloud access security broker, remote browser isolation and more.

RSA

RSA last year pivoted to focus its business entirely on identity security, which it’s doing across its flagship SecurID identity and access management platform along with the recently introduced ID Plus, which delivers identity and access management as a SaaS offering with an option for cloud, on-premises or hybrid versions.

Varonis

Yaki Faitelson

Co-Founder, Chairman, President, CEO

Varonis launched a SaaS version of the company’s data security platform, with the aim of enabling simplified deployment, faster updates to threat models and policies, more proactive detection and response to threats and “autonomous” reduction of cyber risk.

The concept of network security has evolved in the shift to distributed workforces, and so have many of the vendors that have specialized in the area. From vendors o ering secure access service edge (SASE) platforms to those focused on securing IoT assets, here’s a look at 20 key network security companies.

A10 Networks

Dhrupad Trivedi

President, CEO

A10 Networks in December launched a new tool aimed at protecting against distributed denial-of-service attacks. A10 Defend is a SaaS o ering that delivers insight about DDoS threats gleaned from the company’s analysis of past attacks and its deep knowledge of network tra ic patterns.

Armis

Yevgeny Dibrov

Co-Founder, CEO

Offering what it calls a unified asset intelligence platform spanning IT, IoT and industrial IoT systems, the company’s Armis Asset Vulnerability Management platform enables prioritization of threat mitigation activities across the full attack surface of an organization.

Cato Networks

Shlomo Kramer

Co-Founder, CEO

A specialist in the fastgrowing SASE area, Cato Networks offers a platform that combines its Cato SD-WAN offering with its cloud-native security service edge product, Cato SSE 360. Recent enhancements include the addition of data loss prevention capabilities.

Check Point Software Technologies

Gil Shwed Founder, CEO

Check Point recently introduced a new version of its Quantum platform, Check Point Quantum Titan, with a number of new capabilities. The platform uses AI and deep learning to provide advanced threat prevention against attacks such as phishing, DNS exploits and IoT device compromises.

Cisco Systems

Chuck Robbins

Chair, CEO

Cisco last year said that Cisco Security Cloud will serve as the basis for its security strategy going forward. The platform features threat prevention, detection, response and remediation, with the aim of bringing together services across security, networking and threat intelligence with a unified policy engine.

CRN SECURITY 100

Claroty

Claroty recently unveiled its cloud-based industrial cybersecurity offering, Claroty xDome, which aims to provide simplified deployment and scalability while also o ering deep visibility and protection. Key capabilities include asset discovery, vulnerability and risk management, and advanced network segmentation controls.

Gigamon

With the Gigamon Hawk Deep Observability Pipeline, Gigamon taps into network insight to provide greater visibility, as well as assured security and compliance governance. Meanwhile, with its Gigamon ThreatInsight offering, the company has added network detection and response capabilities.

Perimeter 81

Corelight

With its Corelight Investigator offering, the company provides network protection with advanced analytics that leverage open-source insight. The o ering provides security teams with accelerated threat hunting and investigations, as well as with improved alert scoring and reduced alert volume.

Infoblox

Delivering what it has dubbed “next-generation” DNS security, Infoblox provides BloxOne Threat Defense for rapid deployment of DNS-layer security across on-premises, cloud and hybrid environments. Other key offerings include threat intelligence and advanced protection for DNS infrastructure.

Darktrace

CEO

Darktrace expanded its suite of AI-driven security products into attack prevention with the debut of its new Prevent product family. The technology provides enhanced modeling of the potential paths an attacker might take to reach an organization’s most-prized assets, enabling those paths to be prioritized for security measures.

Ivanti

The Ivanti Neurons suite provides a range of capabilities including secure access management that aims to modernize VPN usage with enhanced control of access and increased insight into network and access status. The suite also provides automatic discovery of assets, anomaly detection and self-healing for security issues.

Forescout

Forescout last year launched its automation-driven cybersecurity platform, the Forescout Continuum Platform. The offering aims to provide continuous management of the risk posture of an organization’s assets throughout its digital systems, spanning IT, operational technology, IoT and connected medical devices.

Juniper Networks

Among Juniper’s security offerings is the Juniper Secure Edge, a clouddelivered offering that provides firewall as a service as a single-stack software architecture. The service ultimately aims to enable organizations to more easily transition to a secure access service edge deployment model.

Fortinet

Key o erings from Fortinet include its FortiGate Next Generation Firewall, which aims to outperform traditional firewalls thanks to advanced capabilities such as deep-packet inspection, application control, intrusion prevention, advanced malware detection and increased network visibility, which leverage the inspection of encrypted tra ic.

Palo Alto Networks

Nikesh Arora Chairman, CEO

Palo Alto Networks has an array of o erings including its next-generation firewall portfolio and its secure access service edge platform. With Prisma SASE and Prisma Access, it provides advanced zero trust network access as well as cloud-based secure web gateway and cloud access security broker technologies.

SonicWall

Vectra AI

Versa Networks

Amit

Perimeter 81

o ers secure remote networks based on zero trust architecture, designed to replace legacy firewall and VPN technology. The company’s secure access service edge platform combines network and security functionality while enabling an identity-driven and cloud-based approach to securing businesses.

Robert Vankirk President, CEO

Key offerings from SonicWall in the realm of next-generation firewalls include the SonicWall NSa 5700, which utilizes a scalable hardware architecture designed to fit in a single rack-mountable unit. The high port density of the NSa 5700 includes multiple 10-Gigabit Ethernet and 1-Gigabit Ethernet fiber and copper interfaces.

With a focus on AI-powered threat detection and response for hybrid cloud environments, Vectra AI’s recent updates have included the launch of Attack Signal Intelligence. It aims to provide greater automation for threat detection, triaging and prioritization of cyberthreats.

Kelly Ahuja CEO

While its roots were in SD-WAN, Versa Networks has expanded to provide a full secure access service edge platform that also includes capabilities in zero trust network access, secure web gateway, cloud access security broker, next-generation firewall-as-a-service, remote browser isolation and more.

WatchGuard Technologies

Prakash Panjwani CEO

In the sphere of network security, WatchGuard delivers its Firebox platform comprising a range of offerings and capabilities including firewall and VPN, application control, network discovery, threat detection and response, web and spam blocking, intrusion prevention and SD-WAN.

Key themes this year include a growing focus on helping to secure organizations in a perimeter-less world in which workforces continue to be distributed, the attack surface is expanding and hackers are finding new ways to exploit the situation.

20 SECURITY OPERATIONS, RISK AND THREAT INTELLIGENCE VENDORS

A number of vendors now have products better equipped to meet the needs of any security teams struggling with traditional security information and event management tools. From vendors that provide cloud-native SIEM to those o ering threat intelligence to stay ahead of the hackers, here‘s a look at 20 security operations, risk and threat intelligence companies.

Arctic Wolf

Nick Schneider

President, CEO

Arctic Wolf’s security operations platform has essential capabilities such as 24/7 monitoring and threat detection, as well as response and recovery in the event of an attack. In addition to this managed detection and response o ering, Arctic Wolf provides digital risk management and managed security awareness.

Devo Technology

As security is being recognized as a data analytics problem, Devo o ers a cloud-native alternative to on-premises security information and event management systems that many security teams depend upon. Devo‘s technology promises to enable the use of a greater amount of security data at a substantially reduced cost.

Lightspin

Vladir Sandler

Co-Founder, CEO

Cloud security startup Lightspin delivers a contextdriven security platform for cloud-native and Kubernetes environments. The company recently launched a free tier for its Cloud Native Application Protection Platform (CNAPP), which aims to quickly prioritize and remediate cloud security threats.

Axonius

Dean Sysman

Co-Founder, CEO

With a wide range of offerings for cyber asset attack surface management and SaaS management, Axonius integrates with hundreds of data sources with the aim of providing a comprehensive asset inventory, uncovering gaps and automatically validating and enforcing policies.

Exabeam

BitSight

BlueVoyant

Cado Security

Michael

With its New-Scale security information and event management offering, Exabeam brings together ”cloud-scale” security log management with behavioral analytics and automation-driven cyber investigations. It is built on top of the cloud-native Exabeam Security Operations Platform.

Rapid7

Corey Thomas Chairman, CEO

Rapid7 introduced improved cloud detection and response, used to natively identify serious cloud threats with greater accuracy. The company also recently rolled out enhanced vulnerability assessment, which o ers continuous visibility into vulnerabilities and is easier to deploy thanks to it being an agentless technology.

Steve

Recent updates to BitSight's third-party risk management platform have included the introduction of additional insight for uncovering and prioritizing vulnerabilities and exposures among thirdparty vendors. BitSight also said that its fourthparty risk management product now provides increased supply chain risk visibility.

Google Cloud

Thomas Kurian CEO

With its Chronicle Security Operations platform, Google Cloud brings together security analytics from its earlier Chronicle offering with automated response and remediation for security issues. Google Cloud is further enhancing Chronicle Security Operations with threat intelligence from its acquisition of Mandiant.

Recorded Future

Christopher Ahlberg

Co-Founder, CEO

As a threat intelligence powerhouse, Recorded Future’s Intelligence Cloud brings together continuous data collection with comprehensive graph analysis and analysis from the company’s research team. The platform aims to give “the most complete coverage of intelligence” about malicious adversaries.

Jim

BlueVoyant provides cyber-risk management across internal security with its managed detection and response offering and across external vendors. For external cyber-risk management, BlueVoyant has a unique supply chain defense product that aims to ensure issues are remedied by thirdparty vendors on behalf of BlueVoyant customers.

IBM Security

James

Co-Founder, CEO

With a focus on cyber investigation and response automation, Cado Security delivers a digital forensics offering that is cloud-native, making it uniquely designed for cloud environments. Last summer, the startup unveiled cross-cloud support to help streamline cloud investigations.

KnowBe4

Arvind

Recent moves by IBM Security have included the acquisition of Randori, which brings attack surface management capabilities and o ensive cybersecurity services into the IBM portfolio. Security teams can use insight from Randori fed into IBM Security QRadar extended detection and response for real-time attack surface visibility.

Securonix

Nayaki Nayyar CEO

Securonix unveiled a new product it said is the industry’s first to integrate security information and event management, security orchestration, automation and response, and investigation capabilities. Dubbed Securonix Investigate, it aims to rapidly accelerate threat identification and response by security teams.

Stu Sjouwerman

Founder, CEO

A foremost vendor in the area of security awareness training products, KnowBe4’s flagship offering, Kevin Mitnick Security Awareness Training, focuses on enabling organizations to assess their social engineering risks while providing security awareness training to mitigate these risks.

ServiceNow

Bill McDermott President, CEO

ServiceNow’s security orchestration, automation and response platform covers a lot of bases, including incident and vulnerability response. Key capabilities include AIdriven ”smart“ workflows for faster response times and integrations with tools from Palo Alto Networks, CrowdStrike, Microsoft and Zscaler.

How To Succeed By Seeing The Whole

GlassHive Makes Sales And Marketing Simple And Fun

Q. What is GlassHive, and why should MSPs take notice?

A. GlassHive is a WorkOS for MSPs that automates sales and marketing. It leverages the magic of AI and big data to make the entire process simple and fun! There are more than 14,000 MSPs that use it every day, and they’ve collectively generated more than 200,000 leads so far.

Q. How does GlassHive help MSPs meet sales and marketing goals?

A. GlassHive has a massive library of marketing content and sales automations that magically design to match your colors, logos, font preferences and calls to action. Then it provides you with breathtaking data and visibility into what’s working, what needs improvement and how to improve it. Finally, GlassHive can automate the sales process with journeys that are easy to create.

Q. Why should the channel be excited about the GlassHive platform in 2023?

A. We are launching amazing new features in 2023, such as a proposal designer with digital signing capabilities and a new studio with even more content customization options. Additionally, we are adding broader and more robust automations, VOIP integration, with in-app calling functionalities that include automated speech-to-text transcriptions.

Our new studio ecosystem is expanding every month, and your favorite vendor partners are contributing even more content and resources to GlassHive’s library. All this content is also magically branded for you and has full editing capabilities within GlassHive, so you can customize it however you like—no photoshop required. This is just a sprinkle of the magic making its way into GlassHive in 2023.

”

As children, we believe in magic—and I don’t know at what age that stops, but GlassHive is here to bring it back.

CRN SECURITY 100

Splunk

Sumo Logic

Tenable

Security updates in Splunk Enterprise

9.0 include the expansion of Federated Search functionality to enhance and simplify security investigation and the introduction of Splunk Assist, a fully managed cloud service within the platform that can provide insight about a customer’s security environment.

Venafi

ZeroFox

Ramin

Sumo Logic recently launched support for Amazon Security Lake, which will enable the company to ingest data from the AWS security data lake and ultimately provide customers with improved detection, investigation and response across their AWS, hybrid and onpremises environments.

In October, Tenable unveiled its exposure management platform, Tenable One, which aims to dramatically accelerate the identification and remediation of security vulnerabilities. The platform brings together vulnerability management with external attack surface management, identity management and cloud security data.

Securing the use of machine identities is considered critical in the age of their rapid growth. Venafi recently introduced Venafi Control Plane for Machine Identities, which enables better management and reduced security risk across cloud, on-premises, hybrid and edge environments.

ZeroFox leverages

AI-powered analytics and a variety of data sources to identify and shut down major cyberthreats that originate externally—outside the typical security perimeter— such as targeted phishing and brand hijacking. The company‘s technology works in part by analyzing millions of online posts and messages daily.

WEB, EMAIL AND APPLICATION SECURITY VENDORS

The rise in headline-making critical vulnerabilities is a prime reason why application security needs an overhaul. From vendors o ering developer-friendly code security tools to those protecting websites against cyberattacks, here‘s a look at 20 key web, email and application security companies.

Akamai Technologies

Tom Leighton Co-Founder, CEO

Akamai’s cybersecurity o erings include application and API security, such as capabilities for blocking malicious web activity. Other capabilities include protection against DDoS attacks, abuse and fraud protection, and technologies for enabling a zero trust security posture.

Barracuda Networks

Hatem Naguib President, CEO Barracuda serves small and midsize enterprises with a broad suite of security offerings, including email protection, application security, network security and data protection. The company has expanded into extended detection and response with its Barracuda XDR service supported by a 24/7 Security Operations Center.

Checkmarx

Emmanuel Benzaquen CEO

Checkmarx, an application security testing tool company, recently expanded its portfolio with the introduction of API security. The o ering, which builds on the Checkmarx Fusion vulnerability correlation platform, aims to comprehensively inventory and remediate all APIs in use, including ”shadow” APIs.

Cloudflare

Contrast Security

F5

François Locoh-Donou

President, CEO

Recent additions to the F5 security portfolio arrived via the debut of F5 Distributed Cloud Services. The suite includes application security o erings such as Web Application and API Protection, combining web application firewall, DDoS protection and API security.

iboss

Paul Martini

Co-Founder,

The iboss security platform, focused on enabling a zero trust security posture, includes a range of capabilities such as authorization and access controls, cloud access security broker, data loss prevention, malware and ransomware defense, and browser isolation.

Imperva

Imperva’s portfolio of application security products includes web application firewall, advanced bot protection, API security, DDoS protection, runtime protection and serverless protection. Within data security, Imperva’s lineup includes protection for sensitive data and advanced data governance.

Matthew

Cloudflare has a sizable portfolio of security services for the modern network, spanning DDoS mitigation, zero trust network access, cloud security access broker, secure web gateway and browser isolation. The company has also moved into email security with its acquisition of Area 1 Security.

Lacework

Lacework o ers a datapowered cloud security platform that collects and analyzes data from across cloud environments and supplies customers with key insight. The platform is powered by Lacework’s Polygraph machine learning engine that aims to significantly reduce alert volumes while identifying the most pressing threats.

Alan Naumann Chairman, President, CEO Contrast Security offers its Secure Code Platform that aims to enable security to be baked into applications more easily as well as scanning capabilities for identifying and fixing vulnerabilities via Contrast Scan. Contrast Assess, meanwhile, detects and prioritizes vulnerabilities on a continuous basis.

Menlo Security

Amir

Co-Founder, CEO

Menlo Security’s cloud-native platform includes products such as secure web gateway, remote browser isolation, cloud access security broker, email isolation, data loss prevention and cloud firewall. A key focus of the platform is on preventing threats that are particularly evasive to security controls.

Mimecast

Mimecast recently launched its X1 Platform, aimed at reducing security risks from the growth of hybrid work. Features include X1 Precision Detection, which applies “the right detection capabilities at the right time,” and X1 Data Analytics, which ingests and correlates the huge data volumes generated by its products.

Netskope

Originally known for its cloud access security broker technology, Netskope has expanded to offer a full secure access service edge platform—which, in addition to CASB, offers secure web gateway, zero trust network access, cloud firewall, data loss prevention, remote browser isolation and advanced analytics.

Snyk has products for scanning and remediating code security issues that are designed to be developer-friendly to help enable application security issues to be caught and addressed earlier in the process. The company has also expanded into cloud security posture management with the acquisition of Fugue.

Talon’s secure Chromium-based browser, TalonWork, is aimed at helping to protect organizations with hybrid environments. The browser is hardened against zero day exploits and isolates the work environment from device malware while also providing visibility and governance over SaaS applications and offering advanced network inspection capabilities.

Proofpoint

Proofpoint expanded its threat protection platform with new capabilities for improved visibility and detection of email fraud and recently integrated its advanced email protection offering with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. In December, the company unveiled a deal to acquire identity threat detection and response vendor Illusive.

Qualys

Qualys has a range of o erings across cloud security, asset management, IT security, compliance and web application security. Last year, it launched its extended detection and response platform that uses unique context gleaned from the Qualys asset inventory, patch management and vulnerability management systems.

Salt Security

Salt Security’s API Protection Platform aims to identify and remediate vulnerabilities and other risks in APIs, prior to exploitation by attackers. The platform works by creating a baseline from millions of users and APIs, detecting malicious reconnaissance activity and then blocking the activity.

vArmour offers its Application Policy and Protection

Module, which creates a baseline from the behaviors and relationships of data, apps, services and users and then enables the orchestration of policies in the event of abnormal behavior. Other products include the Data Flows Module to increase control over multi-hop application relationships.

Veracode product enhancements have included updates to its Continuous Software Security Platform, which have brought new features to developers such as extended integrations that support software composition analysis and an API for improving application visibility through a software bill of materials.

Among the many product updates by Zscaler last year were enhancements aimed at simplifying data loss prevention through “zero configuration” capabilities, AI-powered capabilities for its Zero Trust Exchange including phishing prevention and segmentation, and zero trust network access capabilities such as enhanced lateral movement detection.

Cloud Investment Soaring To New Heights

Hundreds of billions of dollars will be spent on cloud infrastructure, software and services this year as more businesses are planning to migrate their IT environments and applications to the cloud.

Many of the largest technology companies are betting big on cloud computing, including Google Cloud, Microsoft and Amazon Web Services—the top three dominant cloud players in the world today.

“Cloud migration is not stopping,” said Sid Nag, vice president analyst at research firm Gartner, in a statement.

“Current inflationary pressures and macroeconomic conditions are having a push-and-pull effect on cloud spending. Cloud computing will continue to be a bastion of safety and innovation, supporting growth during uncertain times due to its agile, elastic and scalable nature,” Nag said.

Worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services alone is set to reach nearly $600 billion in 2023, according to Gartner, with cloud infrastructure and software powering these services.

From cloud infrastructure and cloud monitoring and management to cloud software, security and storage, CRN has named 100 companies leading the way in 2023 in cloud and channel innovation.

By moving operations to cloud infrastructure, customers can reduce capital expenditures by extending spending over a subscription term, which is a key benefit to businesses when having cash is critical to maintaining operations.

Meanwhile, cloud monitoring and management to keep customers’ experiences with their applications in top shape, make sure the software stack is secure and create guardrails against blowing past financial budgets will likely continue to attract new users even as companies take another look at

spending amid potential recession concerns.

When it comes to cloud security, some of the largest and most innovative companies are investing heavily in their products and technologies as more customers migrate their infrastructure, data and applications to the cloud.

With cyberattacks on cloud infrastructure continuing and the COVID-19 pandemic creating a new hybrid workforce, cloud security vendors are playing a more critical role in protecting organizations than ever before.

The shift to cloud-based software, meanwhile, continues to accelerate as businesses and organizations are increasingly taking a Software-as-a-Service-first approach to software consumption, both to replace on-premises legacy systems and implement new systems that offer advanced functionality combined with better flexibility.

Businesses are moving software of all types to cloud platforms— including operational applications such as ERP and CRM, collaboration and communications software, data management and analytics platforms as well as artificial intelligence and application development tools.

On the storage front, organizations are now placing more emphasis on protecting cloud-based data from cybersecurity attacks, especially ransomware.

Cloud storage vendors are tackling the issue of what happens if an attack does occur and either deletes or modifies the data or attaches new attacks to the data that can be sprung if it is recovered. They are responding with technologies such as air gapping, immutability and new ways of authorizing specific users to access data.

From IT hardware and software giants to red-hot startups, here are the 100 cloud computing companies that will make waves in 2023.—By

CLOUD INFRASTRUCTURE VENDORS

Cloud infrastructure powers public, private and hybrid cloud environments with hundreds of billions of dollars up for grabs as more and more businesses migrate to the cloud. Here are 20 companies that are poised to lead the cloud infrastructure market in 2023.—Mark

Amazon Web Services

Cisco Systems

Dell Technologies

Digital Realty

Element Critical

Adam

AWS is pouring billions of dollars into its evergrowing cloud infrastructure footprint on a worldwide basis. The cloud market leader launched new AWS Cloud Regions and data centers in Switzerland, Spain and inside the U.S. last year, with more investments on the horizon for 2023.

Flexential

Flexential, a data center cloud infrastructure provider, has a wide range of cloud offerings to solve complex IT challenges around private, public and hybrid cloud. The Flexential Cloud Fabric gives customers secure, low-latency connections to cloud providers such as AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud.

Lumen Technologies

Kate Johnson President, CEO

Lumen enables customers to connect to and deploy multiple public or private clouds within a single hybrid cloud platform. It also o ers cloud storage and networking infrastructure and has a global data center footprint. In November, the company hired former Microsoft executive Johnson as its new president and CEO.

While Cisco’s hardware powers vast amounts of cloud infrastructure, its portfolio of cloud software for networking, security and application management is elevating the company. Cisco and T-Mobile recently launched the world’s largest cloudnative 5G core gateway to boost performance for customers.

Google Cloud

Google Cloud invests billions of dollars each year in cloud infrastructure across the globe by opening new cloud regions with the goal of increasing its market share. In 2022, Google Cloud entered new markets abroad at a fierce pace, including in Malaysia, Thailand and New Zealand.

Microsoft

Satya Nadella Chairman, CEO

Microsoft spends billions of dollars annually expanding its cloud infrastructure reach by launching new cloud regions and data centers on a global basis. The software and cloud giant’s Intelligent Cloud segment generated $20.3 billion in revenue during its first fiscal quarter 2023 as Azure sales increased 35 percent year over year.

Dell is a leading provider of servers and storage hardware to power cloud infrastructure. It is now doubling down on delivering cloud as a service with offering such as Apex Cloud Services, which provides hybrid or private cloud infrastructure with integrated compute, storage, networking and virtualization resources.

Hewlett Packard

Enterprise

Antonio Neri President, CEO

HPE is a top provider of servers, networking and storage hardware for cloud infrastructure. The HPE GreenLake edge-to-cloud platform o ers Infrastructure as a Service, and the company also introduced new capabilities for HPE GreenLake for Private Cloud Enterprise, which o ers a private cloud with a public cloud experience.

Nutanix Rajiv Ramaswami President, CEO

The Nutanix Cloud Platform lets customers run any application at scale via its software-defined cloud. Compute, storage, virtualization and networking are hyperconverged and driven by software on the platform. Nutanix software also is integrated with hardware platforms from HPE, Cisco and Intel.

Andrew

One of the largest data center providers worldwide, Digital Realty delivers colocation offerings for cloud infrastructure. The company also provides cloud and hybrid offerings to enable customers to get a mix of cloudenabled and privately supported applications to meet all cloud connection needs.

The IBM Cloud portfolio offers a full-stack cloud platform with over 170 products and services—from AI and IoT to containers and blockchain. The IBM Cloud platform combines Platform as a Service and Infrastructure as a Service for public, hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

Ken Parent CEO

Element

Critical's

U.S. data centers bring to life cloud infrastructure and hybrid cloud strategies. Whether it’s for AWS, Microsoft Azure, Oracle or Google Cloud, the company’s EC Cloud Connect delivers direct, private and multi-cloud access with provisioning in minutes.

Lenovo o ers cloud infrastructure via its server, storage and networking hardware portfolio. Its aim is to accelerate customers’ cloud transformation by delivering end-to-end cloud life-cycle management. Lenovo also provides cloud infrastructure as a service via its TruScale Infrastructure Services.

Rackspace Technology

Amar Maletira CEO

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure is billed as the nextgeneration cloud, designed to run any application faster and more securely for a less expensive price tag. The company is investing in opening new cloud regions to expand its cloud infrastructure footprint while forming deeper partnerships with Microsoft and Nvidia.

Rackspace’s RackConnect Global o ering creates a VPN with access to popular cloud infrastructure, while Rackspace Fabric o ers a single platform for automated cloud services. The company specializes in securing, adopting and managing cloud infrastructure and provides about 40 colocation data centers.

Red Hat is a leader in open-source solutions for any application on any cloud. From Red Hat OpenShift for Kubernetes to Red Hat Enterprise Linux, the company can automate, secure and manage hybrid cloud, multi-cloud and edge environments.

Red Hat also has integrations with AWS, Microsoft Azure, IBM Cloud and Google Cloud.

Scale Computing

The Scale Computing Platform for hyperconverged infrastructure delivers scalability and availability for autonomously running applications, including in the cloud. The company partnered with Google to extend to the cloud with SC//Platform Cloud Unity, a hybrid cloud offering to make it easy to move workloads freely in the cloud or on-premises.

SoftIron

Phil

Co-Founder, CEO

SoftIron’s HyperCloud enables IT generalists to build and operate sophisticated hybrid or multi-cloud infrastructure. HyperCloud’s modular nature—combined with the simplicity in adding new compute and storage resources and secure multitenancy capabilities—means the cloud fabric can be scaled up or down to eliminate overprovisioning.

TierPoint

Data center provider

TierPoint

o ers a slew of cloud services, from cloud disaster recovery and big data analytics to managed private cloud and cloud licensing optimization. TierPoint also delivers cloud connectivity and high-performance on-ramps between its data centers and public clouds.

VMware’s software and integrated cloud hardware lets customers build, connect and protect applications on any cloud. VMware Cloud Foundation combines hyperconverged infrastructure, an enterprise-ready Kubernetes environment and cloud services to transform on-premises deployments into SaaSenabled infrastructure.

CLOUD MONITORING AND MANAGEMENT VENDORS

Cloud monitoring and management vendors help keep the customer experience with their applications in top shape, make sure the software stack is secure and create guardrails against going over financial budgets. Here are 20 companies that will be shaking things up this year.—Wade Tyler Millward

AppDynamics

Ronak Desai

SVP, GM, Cisco AppDynamics, Full-Stack Observability

Cisco’s AppDynamics subsidiary has added business transaction insight capabilities to its AppDynamics Cloud observability o ering. The new features allow users to optimize performance and fix issues in near-real-time for AWS-connected applications, services and workloads.

Dynatrace

Rick McConnell CEO

Dynatrace has rolled out its new DevSecOps automation partner program and enhanced its Davis AI engine and Grail causational data lakehouse offerings. The company also extended Grail into power business analytics and Davis into ad hoc exploratory analytics.

Catchpoint

Mehdi Daoudi Co-Founder, CEO

Catchpoint has invested in its digital resilience and experience monitoring o erings with new internet performance monitoring capabilities, a website experience monitoring tool and the expansion of the WebPageTest platform. The company also has added anomaly detection and intelligent metric correlation to its platform.

Exoprise

Jason Lieblich

Founder, President

Exoprise added new capabilities to its Service Watch performance monitoring platform, including the ability for end-to-end network path analysis, packet loss and latency detection for conversations using audio and video, and hop-by-hop diagnosis for streaming applications.

CloudBolt Software

Je Kukowski CEO

CloudBolt has taken its hybrid cloud and cost management tools to the next level with new framework capabilities. In an effort to further automate cloud spend optimization, remediation and other actions, the company added rolebased cloud visibility and reporting and a curated automation and integration elements content library.

Flexera

Jim Ryan President, CEO

Flexera boosted its Flexera One platform with new financial operations o erings while deepening its relationship with IBM. The company added cloud spend anomaly detection based on any dimension, forecasting of cloud spend and usage plus more integration with Jira, ServiceNow and other tools.

Datadog

Datadog has made its cloud cost management and universal microservices monitoring tools generally available. The company also acquired collaboration platform CoScreen, security testing software provider Hdiv, cloud visualization service provider Cloudcraft and API observability tools provider Seekret.

Harness

Jyoti Bansal Co-Founder, CEO

Harness launched a global MSP partner program to expand use of its Cloud Cost Management module for financial operations, DevOps and IT teams. The company also released a fully managed cluster orchestrator tool for optimizing Kubernetes cloud workload costs, deepening its integration with AWS products.

Devo Technology

Marc van Zadelho CEO

Devo has expanded its relationship with AWS, achieving a security competency status and inking a multiyear strategic collaboration designed in part to benefit MSSPs. The company also acquired security orchestration, automation and response provider LogicHub and autonomous threat hunting tool company Kognos.

LogicMonitor

Christina Kosmowski CEO

LogicMonitor launched its LM Envision unified observability platform, giving users new ways to visualize their IT data supply chain and assess the health of thousands of IT assets and applications. The company also launched a framework for resiliency readiness, furthering its status as an expert on digital preparedness.

Moogsoft

Co-Founder,

Moogsoft updated its platform with a correlation results preview function, a workflow engine trigger preview and custom administration roles. The company also added new Windows OS support for Moogsoft Collector, improved the user on-boarding experience and enhanced its incident and alert filters.

PagerDuty

Jennifer Tejada

Chairperson, CEO

PagerDuty beefed up its Operations Cloud, adding integrated customer-facing status pages, more flexible incident workflows and configurable AIOpspowered alert grouping. The company also added automated incident workflows, diagnostics and remediation to Operations Cloud.

Nerdio

Nerdio turned heads with its revamped Partnerd partner program for MSPs and added features to its Nerdio Manager for MSPs tool, including scripted actions and an approval workflow. The company last year announced a $117 million Series B round of funding, positioning the company well for 2023.

ScienceLogic

David Link

Founder, CEO

ScienceLogic acquired Zebrium last year, boosting its machine learning analytics capabilities. The addition of application diagnostics to ScienceLogic’s platform gives the company an edge as 2023 unfolds. In December, it reported $10.78 million in net annual contract value and 36 percent growth year over year.

Netreo

Netreo inked an agreement with Arrow Electronics to help it sell exclusively through the channel and rolled out new features in its cloud monitoring products. The company’s tools provide observability and monitoring for products by Google, Salesforce and other cloud providers.

Spectro Cloud

Tenry Fu Co-Founder, CEO

Spectro Cloud’s Palette 3.0 aims to bring more control to Kubernetes environments, better fleet management and an improved developer experience. The company also introduced a new release of the Palette Edge platform, adding hardened edge Kubernetes distribution with immutable, read-only stacks.

20 CLOUD SECURITY VENDORS

New Relic

New Relic overhauled its partner program, increasing resources for its growing roster of partners. On the product side, the company launched add-ons for more AWS offerings, expanded access to its vulnerability management offering and made its Monitoring for SAP Solutions tool generally available.

OpsRamp

Varma

Co-Founder,

OpsRamp in 2022 surpassed 2,500 integrations with its digital operations management tools, covering almost every commonly used technology by service providers. The company also broadened its AIOps platform with integrated log management, centralized log ingestion, automated log parsing and log archiving.

Uila unveiled new intelligent Nvidia GPU metrics in its uObserve observability platform so that desktop teams can optimize virtual desktop performance. The company also added intelligent log analysis for multi-cloud environments and a customizable scripting capability for VMware o erings.

Virtana’s new Kubernetes strategy delivers container support across its portfolio and actionable infrastructure insight for users. It has expanded that strategy with infrastructure performance management and monitoring support, with the same real-time information for containers as users have for legacy cloud infrastructure.

Cyberattacks on cloud infrastructure are always top of mind for organizations, and cloud security vendors have to constantly innovate to protect cloud data, applications and hardware from threats. Here are 20 companies that are set to make waves in 2023.

Check Point Software Technologies

Aqua Security has a vast portfolio of container security, serverless, supply chain and dynamic threat analysis cybersecurity o erings. It dubs its Aqua Platform as the industry’s most integrated cloud-native application protection platform, prioritizing risk and automating prevention, detection and response across the life cycle.

Gil Shwed Founder, CEO Check Point has been beefing up its cloud offerings across the board, including through the acquisition of Tel Aviv, Israel-based Spectral. Spectral is a startup focusing on developerfirst security tools and was the company’s fifth cloud security acquisition in three years.

Shai Morag Co-Founder, CEO

Ermetic, a cloud infrastructure security company, raised $70 million in new funding last year for its identity-first cloud o ering. The startup also recently appointed Scott Hoard, a former Fortanix channel executive, as the new head of global channel sales.

Ken Xie

Founder, Chairman, CEO

Fortinet has a wide range of cloud security o erings. The company’s FortiGate Cloud is a cloud-based SaaS o ering, delivering a range of management and services for Fortinet FortiGate firewalls. Fortinet also has launched a new managed cloudnative firewall service.

Illumio

Andrew Rubin Co-Founder, CEO

Illumio, a zero trust segmentation company, provides offerings designed to stop breaches from spreading across the hybrid attack surface. Its CloudSecure delivers agentless visibility for cloud-native applications and infrastructure across multi-cloud and hybrid environments.

Imperva

Pam

Imperva provides data security software designed to protect data through all stages of its digital transformation, with cloud-based security services among its portfolio of o erings. Imperva has raised nearly $100 million to date.

Lacework

Jay Parikh CEO

Lacework is a data-driven cloud security company that secures cloud-native applications across the entire life cycle. Its platform collects, analyzes and correlates data to narrow it down to the handful of security events that matter. It works across customers’ AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud and Kubernetes environments.

Palo Alto Networks

Nikesh Arora Chairman, CEO

Palo Alto Networks has over the past four years been on an acquisition binge, largely to broaden its cloud o erings. In late 2022, the company acquired Cider Security and its portfolio of application and supply chain security products as part of Palo Alto Networks‘ approach to secure the entire application security life cycle from code to cloud.

Skyhigh Security

Gee Rittenhouse CEO

Skyhigh Security, formerly McAfee Enterprise, launched in March as a new cloud security company focused on the security service edge market. Skyhigh recently hired its first-ever global channel chief, Scott Goree, formerly head of worldwide distribution sales and channel renewal sales at Nutanix.

Proofpoint

Ashan Willy CEO

Proofpoint, known for its email, compliance and other security tools, has a solid presence in the cloud with its Proofpoint Cloud App Security Broker. The company recently enhanced its Threat Protection Platform to boost customers’ visibility and detection of email fraud and better defend against third-party and supplier compromises.

Sophos

Kris Hagerman CEO

Sophos has a number of cloud-based offerings available, and the security star keeps adding to its product lineup. In 2022, the company acquired cloud-based security alert investigation and triage automation solution provider SOC.OS, enabling Sophos to expand its Adaptive Cybersecurity Ecosystem solution.

Laminar

Amit Shaked

Co-Founder, CEO Cloud data security startup Laminar raised $30 million in June, bringing the total it has raised to $67 million since its founding in 2021. Laminar in October launched Laminar Labs to help businesses protect their most sensitive cloud data.

Qualys

Netskope

Sanjay Beri

Founder, CEO

Netskope is known for its secure access service edge architecture aimed at redefining cloud, data and network security. In the first week of 2023, Netskope said it had raised $401 million via convertible notes it plans to use to further develop its SASE products and channel-centric go-tomarket strategy.

Securonix

Orca Security

Avi Shua

Co-Founder, CEO

Orca Security describes itself as a pioneer of agentless cloud security and compliance, working for AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform. In October, the company released what it called the first agentless API security offering for multi-cloud environments.

Semperis

Sumedh

Qualys is a cloud security stalwart, providing a number of cloud-based IT, security and compliance offerings. In October, the company said it was acquiring the assets of Blue Hexagon, bringing AI/machine learning to the Qualys Cloud Platform. Qualys is also a founding member of the Cloud Security Alliance.

Trellix

Bryan Palma CEO

Trellix was formed in early 2022 through the merger of FireEye and McAfee Enterprise, creating an extended detection and response business that integrates capabilities in the endpoint, network and security operations fields with a solid cloud strategy. In September, the company unveiled its first independent partner program.

Nayaki Nayyar CEO

Securonix, a provider of next-gen SIEM and XDR offerings, was hot in 2022—to the tune of $1 billion. That’s the amount Vista Equity Partners and other financial firms invested in Securonix last February. Securonix said its next-gen SIEM and XDR are powered by the most advanced analytics and built on a scalable, flexible cloud-native architecture.

Trend Micro

Eva Chen

Co-Founder, CEO

Trend Micro o ers cybersecurity platforms for hybrid cloud and products that span across clouds, networks and devices. The company launched Trend Micro One last year with the aim of making it easier for customers and partners to view and assess their attack surfaces and risk postures.

Mickey Bresman CEO

Semperis, a provider of identify offerings for hybrid Active Directory users, raised about $200 million in Series C funding in 2022, bringing its total raised to $250 million since its founding in 2015. The company said its product is purpose-built to help security teams charged with defending hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

Zscaler

Jay Chaudhry

Founder, Chairman, CEO Zscaler grew its portfolio in 2022 with the purchase of ShiftRight, a startup specializing in closedloop security workflow automation. Zscaler now plans to integrate ShiftRight’s technology with a number of its corporate products moving forward.

Worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services alone is set to reach nearly $600 billion in 2023, according to research firm Gartner.

Channel Chief View

VIPRE Transforms Channel Business For

2023

Q.What is your channel philosophy?

A. We are committed to empower our partners by providing them all business, technical and marketing support needed. We are humbled by the responsibility to provide the right environment to help them grow. We call it the VIPRE Partner Community because we are looking to build more than just a network, but a community of happy, inspired partners that have no barriers in front of them to be successful with our teams and solutions. In a nutshell, we want our partners to see value in VIPRE and to really enjoy working with us.

Q.Why did you get into the channel?

A. I love the channel because of the relationships. I have worked both sides of the channel and I really enjoy building partnerships that are good for all. The IT channel community is so unique and special that there’s nothing like it in the world.

Q.What are your plans for VIPRE partners in 2023?

A. Since July of last year, we made an eight-figure investment into our channel business. In such a short time, we launched our new partner program, revamped our partner portal, doubled our channel sales team, restructuring them regionally to better assist our partners. We also aligned our named/end user sales teams to our channel organization for co-selling and collaboration and opened our product portfolio to make it easier to sell the entire suite of VIPRE solutions. This year, we are going to continue to drive business by investing in a detailed distribution strategy, creating an influencer program to work closer with non-traditional channels and adding new functionality into our PRM system. We are also excited to launch our inaugural partner council to solicit feedback on our go-to-market strategies and our product roadmaps.

Q.Why should the channel be excited about VIPRE?

A. VIPRE is very special place because we’re a great company. We have amazing solutions, and our team is full of incredible people. For someone who has been doing this for a while, I know that does not come around often. Add that to our channel fanatical go to market I am excited to share this with our existing partners and future partners to come.

”We have amazing solutions, and our team is full of incredible people. For someone who has been doing this for a while, I know that does not come around often.

CLOUD SOFTWARE VENDORS

The shift to cloud-based software continues to accelerate as businesses increasingly take a SaaS-first approach to software consumption to replace on-premises legacy systems and implement new ones with advanced functionality. Here are 20 innovative companies leading the charge in 2023.—Rick Whiting

Unstructured data can account for up to 80 percent of an organization’s data— much of it hidden “dark data.” Aparavi has been gaining attention with its data intelligence and automation platform that identifies, classifies and optimizes unstructured data wherever it resides, helping businesses mitigate risk and reduce costs and storage.

Drata provides a compliance and automation platform that businesses use to ensure adherence to regulatory and security frameworks. The system automates compliance operations and evidence collection, using monitoring integrations across SaaS services to create a single view of applications, devices and risk.

Informatica

Amit Walia CEO

Informatica is a longtime player in the data management and integration space and is continuing that role with its flagship Intelligent Data Management Cloud platform as more data—and more data operations— move to the cloud. Its portfolio includes tools for data management, quality, governance and transformation.

Cloudera

Robert Bearden

Cloudera bills itself as the hybrid data company, providing its Cloudera Data Platform as the foundation for a range of data services including data analytics, data management and machine learning. In August Cloudera launched CDP One, a SaaS data lakehouse that enables self-service analytics and data science tasks.

FinancialForce

FinancialForce said its cloud-native ERP and professional services applications provide a customer-centric view of a business’ operations. Its applications are built on Force.com, the Salesforce cloud platform. The FinancialForce portfolio includes cloud ERP software for accounting, billing and supply chain management.

Intermedia

Michael Gold CEO

Intermedia, a cloud communications company, o ers a range of integrated collaboration and unified communications offerings including voice, videoconferencing, chat, contact center, business email, file sharing and archiving, and security. Channel-centric Intermedia sells its services through more than 7,200 partners.

Cockroach Labs

Spencer Kimball Co-Founder, CEO

Cockroach Labs is a standout among the wave of next-gen database systems. The company’s CockroachDB is a cloudnative, distributed SQL database that’s designed to handle application workloads with huge volumes of transactional data. The company has raised more than $633 million in funding since its 2015 founding.

FiveTran

As more data becomes increasingly scattered across cloud and on-premises systems, pulling it all together is a challenge. FiveTran’s automated data movement platform uses extract and load technology to centralize data, replicates it in databases and SaaS applications and performs integrated data transformations.

Intuit

Sasan Goodarzi CEO

Intuit’s QuickBooks portfolio is the operating backbone for many small businesses, including QuickBooks Online applications for managing income and expenses, invoices and more. The company is now also o ering QuickBooks Commerce for managing omnichannel sales and is adding AI capabilities across its applications.

Databricks

Databricks is a leading proponent of the data lakehouse, a system that combines elements of traditional data warehouses and data lakes for a range of analysis, engineering, AI, machine learning and governance tasks. Databricks has been working with partners to develop vertical industry solutions around its Databricks Lakehouse Platform.

GitLab

GitLab’s DevSecOps platform is designed to shorten application cycle times, reduce development costs and improve productivity. It integrates the application development process from planning, coding and testing new software through the release, deployment and monitoring phases— all surrounded by a layer of security.

MongoDB

Dev Ittycheria President, CEO

MongoDB has been gaining attention with its MongoDB Atlas multi-cloud database and developer data platform for building enterprise, data-centric applications. The company has established extensive alliances with the major cloud platform providers including Google Cloud, AWS and Microsoft Azure.

Dbt Labs

Tristan

Startup Dbt Labs provides data transformation and analytics engineering software that works within cloud data warehouses to produce trusted data sets for data analytics and reporting, machine learning modeling and operational workflows. Its development framework combines modular SQL with software engineering best practices.

IGEL

Jed

CEO

IGEL OS is a hardwareagnostic, managed endpoint OS designed for secure access to any digital workspace, including VDI, Desktop as a Service and cloud workspaces. IGEL is driving to make the nextgen edge OS the standard for Windows workspace computing across any device or cloud.

Salesforce

Marc Benio Chair, CEO

Salesforce has continued to expand its cloud reach through such blockbuster acquisitions as Tableau, MuleSoft and Slack that have extended its cloud portfolio. The recent launch of DevOps Center helps developers build, test and deploy custom apps on the Salesforce platform that tap into realtime customer data.

SAP

SAP has been moving its customers to the cloud with such flagship products as the SAP S/4HANA Cloud suite of ERP applications, the SAP Business Technology Platform, and cloud applications for supply chain management, human capital management and CRM, among others.

ServiceNow

As businesses undertake digital transformation initiatives, they often find that traditional software can be too inflexible. ServiceNow’s cloud computing platform is used to digitize, automate and manage siloed business processes and workflows, including processes for IT service operations.

Snowflake

Snowflake has become a leading force in the data service provider space with its data cloud platform that businesses use to unite siloed data, discover and securely share it, and execute a range of analytic workloads. More recently the company has been expanding into data marketplaces, focusing on vertical industry solutions.

CLOUD STORAGE VENDORS

Starburst

Starburst develops the Starburst Enterprise system— based on the Trino distributed query engine— that provides a way to perform analytics on data no matter where it resides. Its Galaxy cloud software performs cross-cloud query, ETL and business analytics tasks across data warehouses, data lakes and data lakehouses.

Tecton

Founded by the team who built Uber’s Michelangelo machine learning system, Tecton is a rising star in the machine learning space. The startup’s enterprise feature store platform enables data teams to build machine learning features using real-time data and quickly put them into production.

The cloud storage industry has over the past few years been focused on developing better ways to tie legacy on-premises storage with storage in hybrid and public multi-cloud infrastructures. And now the emphasis is on protecting cloud-based data. Here are 20 vendors doing just that.—Joseph F. Kovar

Arcserve

Brannon Lacey CEO

Arcserve has been protecting data for decades with its software and hardware appliances and Backup and Disaster Recovery as a Service. The company provides cloud-based data protection that scales and offers multitenant capabilities, defending against cyberattacks with threat prevention, detection and ransomware recovery.

Cohesity

Sanjay Poonen

President, CEO

Cohesity started as a data protection technology developer but has since branched out to focus on the security and management of data, particularly on ways to protect cloudbased and on-premises data against ransomware. The company in 2022 brought in former VMware COO Poonen as president and CEO.

AvePoint

Tianyi “TJ” Jiang Co-Founder, CEO

AvePoint offers SaaS technologies to migrate, manage and protect data in Microsoft 365 and has over 9 million cloud users. AvePoint’s SaaS technologies are also available via MSPs who use it to support and manage their SMB customers. Its multitenant capabilities are available from distributors in over 100 cloud marketplaces.

Commvault

Sanjay Mirchandani

President, CEO

Commvault has evolved from a data protection developer into a cloud-focused data protection and data transformation powerhouse via its software and hardware appliances. It has been increasingly active in protecting data from SaaS applications from companies like Microsoft and SAP with its Metallic Cloud Storage Service.

Axcient

Rod Mathews President, CEO

Axcient provides a suite of business availability technologies specifically for MSPs. They use x360Recover for backup and disaster recovery, x360Cloud for Microsoft application data protection and x360Sync for anti-ransomware protection to help customers protect their data in business and remote work scenarios.

DataCore Software

Dave Zabrowski

CEO

DataCore is a pioneer in softwaredefined storage, with capabilities for turning any hardware into block, file and object storage systems. It has been moving quickly to become a leader in container-native storage since its late 2021 acquisition of MayaData and last year introduced enterprise-grade container storage.

Backblaze

Gleb Budman Co-Founder, CEO

Backblaze develops the B2 cloud, which it uses to provide an alternative to AWS for pay-as-you-go storage as a service supporting app development, ransomware protection and data backups. The company also provides automatic unlimited backup for laptops and desktops to businesses and individuals on a subscription basis.

Hammerspace

David

Co-Founder,

Technology from Hammerspace connects global users with their data and applications across their existing data center infrastructures or AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud services. The latest version of its software includes improved scaleout performance to up to 16 clusters, improved metadata performance and an enhanced GUI.

Cloudian

Michael Tso Co-Founder, CEO

Cloudian develops file and object storage technology for S3-compatible object storage systems. Its object-based platform, HyperStore, and its HyperFile object storagebased file system—which combines NAS features with scale-out performance—are available via solution providers and strategic vendor partners.

HYCU

Simon

The HYCU Protégé platform provides extensible multi-cloud data protection and lets businesses move, protect and recover data in complex hybrid and multi-cloud environments with native data protection technology for every data source. It also provides one-click recovery, granular recovery objectives and applicationconsistent backups.

Komprise

Komprise develops technology for unstructured data management and mobility. Its Komprise Intelligent Data Management offering lets businesses point the service at any file storage in the cloud or in a data center to get full analytics of the data and migrate it while keeping it in its native format.

Pure Storage

Pure Storage is a developer of all-flash storage arrays based on multiple technologies and has paired those arrays with cloud connectivity and the ability to o er storage as a service. This gives customers the agility and flexibility of public cloud storage with the security and performance of on-premises all-flash technology.

MSP360

MSP360, formerly known as CloudBerry Lab, provides data protection and IT management technologies for MSPs and IT departments. The company’s MSP360 platform combines data protection for cloud and on-premises data with secure remote access software to support customers or employees along with the company’s own RMM tool.

Rewind helps businesses protect their SaaS and cloud data with the Rewind platform, which provides data backup, restore and copy management. The company’s technology protects data from leading SaaS applications and allows businesses to remain compliant with data security regulations.

Nasuni

Nasuni is a pioneer developer of cloud-native file systems. The company’s UniFS lets businesses scale to any level to unify isolated silos of file storage at hundreds of locations around the world into a single cloud o ering that replaces traditional onpremises primary and secondary file storage.

NetApp is at the forefront in tying onpremises storage to the cloud in a seamless fashion and has in the past few years moved to bring all its technology to the cloud. This allows businesses to manage and migrate data between on-premises and cloud infrastructure in the same way.

Panzura

Panzura’s CloudFS

Global File System consolidates data from multiple locations into a single authoritative data source that’s deduplicated, compressed and protected against ransomware. It dynamically coordinates where files are stored, what gets sent to the cloud, who has edit and access rights and how data is managed.

Veeam Software

Anand Eswaran CEO

Veeam’s platform protects virtual, physical and cloud-based data with native capabilities for Microsoft, Oracle, SAP HANA and Kubernetes applications as well as from SaaS applications including Microsoft 365, Microsoft Teams and Salesforce. Data can be backed up and recovered from anywhere to anywhere in a cloud-native fashion.

Veritas Technologies

Greg Hughes CEO

Veritas is a leader in multi-cloud data management, with over 80,000 customers using the company’s technology to protect, recover and ensure compliance of their data. Veritas‘ technology provides data protection and cyber resilience with support for more than 800 data sources, 100 operating systems, 1,400 storage targets and 60 clouds.

Wasabi Technologies

David Friend

Co-Founder, President, CEO

Wasabi’s Hot Cloud Storage provides cloud storage technology the company says costs one-fifth the price of competitive cloud storage offering with no egress fees, API call charges or additional hidden fees. Hot Cloud Storage is available direct to solution providers or as the back end to cloud storage from multiple data protection vendors.

Channel Chief View

Partners Achieve Business Goals With WSO2

Q. What is WSO2 and how has the company evolved over the years?

A. Founded in 2005, WSO2 enables thousands of enterprises, including hundreds of the world’s largest corporations, top universities and governments, to drive their digital transformation journeys—executing more than 60 trillion transactions and managing more than 1 billion identities annually. Using WSO2 for API management, integration and customer identity and access management, these organizations are harnessing the full power of their APIs to securely deliver their digital services and applications. Our open-source, API-first approach to software that runs on-premises and in the cloud helps developers and architects to be more productive and rapidly compose digital products to meet demand while remaining free from vendor lock-in. WSO2 has more than 900 employees worldwide with offices in Australia, Brazil, Germany, India, Sri Lanka, the UAE, the UK and the U.S.

Q. How is WSO2 a great fit for the channel?

A. WSO2 is continually working to make it easier for our partners to sell to their customers and prospects. To do this, we can help our partner sales teams to focus on solution selling. We are constantly enabling partner sales/pre-sales teams with easy-to-use content that will help them communicate value and solutions that can be rapidly achieved through our platform offerings. We also help partners with innovative pricing models that will suit their customers’ requirements, allowing them to effectively achieve their customers’ business outcomes. Finally, we have revamped our Partner Portal, which becomes a single location for all our partners’ needs, thus allowing our partners an enhanced experience. The Partner Portal houses all the resources from training, business development artifacts, marketing tools, solution development, technical documentation and access to our technical teams for any sales/pre-sales queries.

Q. What does WSO2 have planned for partners this year?

A. We believe a healthy partner ecosystem is the only way enterprise software vendors can reach scale and be able to provide innovative and cutting-edge solutions to customers globally. WSO2 makes it easy for our partner sales/pre-sales/project teams to help customers achieve their business goals through our solutions. We ensure that our partners are rewarded extremely well for their efforts, as they help us rapidly gain significant market share.

Demand For MSPs Is At An All-Time High

The MSP business is showing no signs of slowing down. After exploding in 2020 and 2021 when the COVID-19 pandemic forced millions of people to work from home, the demand for cloud-based managed services, including access to business applications, data backup and storage systems, and communications and collaboration tools, has continued to grow.

Along with providing IT services to their distributed workforces—a post-COVID model that appears here to stay— businesses and organizations recognize that relying on MSPs provides a range of benefits including lower capital spending, reduced cybersecurity threats, faster access to leading-edge IT, a way to surmount the continued shortage of IT skilled workers, and a smoother path for cloud migration and digital transformation initiatives.

No wonder then that market researcher Precedence Research is predicting global spending for MSP services to reach $349.3 billion this year and $757.1 billion by 2030—a 12.6 percent CAGR. That’s up from $312.7 billion in 2022.

For 2023, CRN has assembled the MSP 500, an annual list that

recognizes North American MSPs and managed security service providers (MSSPs) that have proven track records of innovation and growth. A sampling of the list appears on the following pages and the complete list can be found on CRN.com.

In their applications for this year’s list, MSPs answered a number of questions about their businesses and their outlook for 2023, including what emerging technology areas they see as presenting the biggest opportunities. We have included their answers on the following pages along with the previous years each MSP has been on the list.

The MSP 500 is organized into three categories. The MSP Elite 150 have an extensive managed services portfolio, including on-premises and off-premises capabilities, weighted toward midmarket and enterprise customers. The MSP Pioneer 250 have largely built their business model around providing managed services to SMB customers. And the Managed Security 100 spotlights MSPs with cloud-based security, services and expertise.

For information on purchasing the complete list with all collected firmographic data, please contact sales@thechannelcompany.com.

Elite 150

COMPANY/YEARS ON LIST

ACCESS SYSTEMS

Waukee, Iowa

Years on list: 2022

ADVIZEX

Independence, Ohio

Years on list: 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

ATSG

New York

Years on list: 2015, 2016, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

CDI

New York

Years on list:

2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

COMPULINK TECHNOLOGIES

New York

Years on list: 2019

EMTEC

Jacksonville, Fla.

Years on list:

2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

GREENPAGES

Portsmouth, N.H.

Years on list:

2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

MAINMICRO

New York

New to list

NETRIX

Bannockburn, Ill.

Years on list:

2014, 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

QUATRRO BUSINESS SUPPORT SERVICES

Marietta, Ga.

Years on list: 2022

TOP EXECUTIVE WHAT EMERGING TECHNOLOGY AREAS WILL BRING THE BIGGEST OPPORTUNITY THIS YEAR?

Shane Sloan CEO

C.R. Howdyshell President

Anthony D’Ambrosi CEO

Access Systems plans to continually di erentiate itself from competitors regarding security services and the customer service experience.

ServiceNow is going to be a big focus for Advizex and is going to allow it to increase overall company revenue.

As ATSG’s enterprise clients and partners adopt work-from-anywhere models and look for more robust cybersecurity consulting and operational o erings, ATSG will add deep, new capabilities and leverage proven software/API development processes to enhance the portfolio.

CDI sees digital business, managed services and managed security services as key emerging technologies.

Rich Falcone President, CEO

Denise Arboleda VP, Sales

Compulink believes security, cloud, device management, network monitoring and sta ng will be key areas to focus on.

Sunil Misra President, CEO

Ron Dupler CEO

Georges Chebli VP, Sales, Co-Owner

Russ Reeder CEO

Emtech sees cognitive services, intelligent automation (Robotic Process Automation), multi-provider automation via microservices, arti cial intelligence/machine learning, managed cybersecurity services, and data and analytics as key.

GreenPages will be focusing on cloud, cybersecurity and digital transformation.

Mainmicro will be eyeing cybersecurity, network management, hyperconverged infrastructure and cloud.

The biggest opportunities Netrix sees are in cybersecurity, serving as a managed security service provider (MSSP) and optimizing cloud-managed services.

C M Sharma Chairman, CEO

Quatrro sees a large need in the market for better visibility leading to analysis for actionable insight that leaders can leverage to remain competitive today. As environments become more complex, so too have the number of data points available, often with no real way to make sense of all of it. Consolidation of the data into one central place while then also taking the added step of presenting that data back to the organization in a way that provides helpful analysis and insight, making the data actionable, is what is needed to help leaders reach their desired business outcomes. This area of need is why Quatrro has invested so heavily in continuing to re ne its Cloud Interconnect and Xport platforms.

Elite 150

COMPANY/YEARS

RAPIDSCALE, A COX BUSINESS COMPANY

Raleigh, N.C.

New to list

SOFTWAREONE

Milwaukee

Years on list: 2020, 2021, 2022

THE JUDGE GROUP

Wayne, Pa.

Years on list: 2022

WACHTER TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS

Mount Laurel, N.J.

New to list

ZONES

Auburn, Wash.

Years on list: 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

Duane Barnes VP, GM

Ashley Gaare President, North America

John Battaglia President, CTO, Judge Consulting and Copley Consulting Group

Brian Sloan CEO

RapidScale will be looking at managed Azure Virtual Desktop, managed secure access service edge and Desktop as a Service.

SoftwareOne will look at FinOps from a cost control and ROI perspective and have a programmatic focus on outcomes.

The Judge Group is continuing to see a lot of investment in cloud strategy and digital transformation as well as manufacturing automation.

IoT sensors and the data derived from them will be a key growth area for 2023. Wachter Technology Solutions is focused on creating total solutions that yield actionable intelligence and positive business outcomes.

Firoz Lalji Chairman, CEO

Pioneer 250

COMPANY/YEARS

3RD ELEMENT CONSULTING

Mechanicsburg, Pa.

Years on list: 2019, 2021, 2022

ADVANTAGE INDUSTRIES

Columbia, Md. New to list

ALVAREZ TECHNOLOGY GROUP

Salinas, Calif.

Years on list: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2020, 2021

APEX DIGITAL SOLUTIONS

South eld, Mich.

Years on list: 2019, 2020, 2021

ASSURED DATA PROTECTION

Herndon, Va. New to list

Dawn Sizer CEO

Keith Heilveil President

One of the most signi cant breakthroughs in technology that will occur in 2023 is the implementation of blockchain technology.

Luis Alvarez President, CEO

Zero trust and all things surrounding the framework for security will be key areas of focus.

Jason Lambiris CEO

Stacy Hayes Co-Founder, EVP

IT security continues to be a big driver in the marketplace. Advantage Industries believes that compliance requirements such as cyber insurance and federal and state regulations will provide opportunities for growth.

Security services will continue to drive business for Alvarez Technology Group in 2023.

In 2023, there will be an increased focus on hybrid work technology such as Microsoft Teams Rooms, Teams Phone and at-home meeting services. This technology will become a key tool for organizations to align with the changing needs of the workforce and take advantage of remote working.

Zero trust is becoming the de facto security posture in the industry. This requires more expert resources to be able to protect and secure data, which bodes well for a managed service business such as Assured Data Protection.

Channel Chief View

AOM Lifecyle Management— ‘We Do IT For Life’

Q. Why is AOM different than TPM?

A. AOM (Alternative to OEM Maintenance), a lifecycle management offering, was created with the charter to empower all distribution channel resellers with the tools and support to manage their customers assets for life. TPM starts years after the initial ship date and TPM providers usually are direct competitors to channel resellers.

Unlike TPM, AOM is there for your customers from the very beginning of the assets’ lifecycle. We’ve partnered with the biggest distributors in the world to help populate your portal with all the asset information from the time of sale to give your customers the best experience possible. Based off the International Association of IT Asset Managers (IAITAM), our end-user facing cloud-based portal “Epicenter” is an asset, license, subscription management tool and service delivery portal. From the day your distribution partner ships your end-users’ product to the end of its life, AOM is going to help you capture more revenue opportunities for the life of that asset.

Q. Why is AOM critical to the success of reseller partners over the next few years?

A. We believe a proactive asset management service offered by our reseller partners will generate incremental revenue long after the initial sale. From memory upgrades, break fix/end of life hardware support, extended warranties, maintenance and ITAD, “we do IT for life”.

The Founder of IAITAM, Dr. Barb Rembiesa says, “If you’re not managing your assets, you’re not managing your business.”1 She’s referring to the end user, but shouldn’t we, as VARs, MSPs and NSPs be managing our customers assets as a “value add” or “managed service”? We believe you should, and Epicenter by AOM is how we’re going to do it.

Q. Why should resellers choose AOM’s Epicenter over existing asset management and service delivery platforms?

A. There’s a lot of reasons, let’s give you the top three. One, we’re not a software company, we’re a maintenance company. Our tool is free to our reseller partners, they can choose to monetize it or incorporate lifecycle management into a hardware deal, giving them a competitive advantage. Two, AOM, a Zepol Productions Inc. company, is minority and veteran owned. If you choose to partner with us and enroll in our supplier diversity program, you and your end user can retire diversity spend while offering true value add with lifecycle management. Three, we are the only TPM provider that is truly channel friendly. We offer lifetime non-compete, non-circumvent and non-solicit down to the serial number. And D, we’re funnier than they are.

1 Dr. Barb Rembiesa, https://iaitam.org/

https://aompartner.com/epicenter/

”We believe a proactive asset management service offered by our reseller partners will generate incremental revenue long after the initial sale. From memory upgrades, break fix end of life hardware, extended warranties, maintenance and ITAD, “we do IT for life”.

COMPANY/YEARS ON LIST TOP EXECUTIVE WHAT EMERGING TECHNOLOGY AREAS WILL BRING THE BIGGEST OPPORTUNITY THIS YEAR?

BASE SOLUTIONS

Tysons Corner, Va.

Years on list: 2019, 2021, 2022

BLUE LAYER

Lubbock, Texas

Years on list: 2018, 2020, 2021, 2022

BROADVIEW NETWORKS

Winnipeg, Manitoba

Years on list: 2017, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022

C3 INTEGRATED SOLUTIONS

Arlington, Va.

New to list

CLOUDTICITY

Seattle

Years on list: 2018, 2019, 2020, 2022

COMMON KNOWLEDGE TECHNOLOGY

Englewood, Colo.

Years on list:

2019, 2021, 2022

CONVERGENCE NETWORKS

Portland, Ore.

Years on list:

2014, 2015, 2022

DAYSTAR

Newington, N.H.

Years on list: 2021, 2022

EXPEDIENT TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS

Miamisburg, Ohio

Years on list: 2016, 2017, 2018, 2020, 2021, 2022

FORTIFY 24X7

Point Roberts, Wash.

Years on list: 2018, 2022

Atul Bhagat President, CEO

Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certi cation (CMMC) will be key this year.

Michael Strong COO

SOC and governance risk compliance (GRC) solutions will be an important focus.

Michael Orlo President

Cybersecurity is the top area. With the rising cost of cyber insurance, customers need to keep premiums a ordable by investing in their cybersecurity prevention.

Marc Pantoni CEO

Gerry Miller Founder, CEO

Secure access service edge (SASE) and cloud-native security tools that enable zero trust for example, Azure Active Directory, will be critical.

Health care has moved forward dramatically, with a decade’s worth of technology adaptation and adoption in the space of mere months. High-speed research and epidemiology infrastructure, remote work and telemedicine systems, models for rapid vaccine development and deployment all suddenly became pressing public-health necessities. All were enabled by harnessing the cloud to support integrated operations, data science and massive on-demand computational needs.

Peter Horewitch President

Chris Remy CEO

Building out a virtual CISO o ering to help manage new security programs and building a culture around security at customers are the key focus areas for Common Knowledge Technology in 2023.

Cybersecurity is going to be a driver of service more than ever, with the need for more advanced cloud security monitoring and alerting, Cyber SOC and compliance requirements, including network penetration testing.

Keith Bamford Co-Founder, CEO

Daystar is launching a new service around end user productivity measurement and application training and optimization. It is starting with the Microsoft stack but will expand this out in years to come. This will give customers visibility into usage and gaps in their teams’ use of software applications and strategy to increase productivity and engagement.

Marcus Thompson CEO

Jeremy Murtishaw CEO

Expedient Technology Solutions sees continued opportunity in managed cybersecurity and compliance solutions as well as penetration testing and cybersecurity strategy.

Fortify 24x7’s MDR and XDR services continue to grow, and the company is seeing rapid expansion in governance risk compliance (GRC) services.

FUSE NETWORKS

Tukwila, Wash.

Years on list: 2019, 2022

IN-TELECOM CONSULTING

Slidell, La.

New to list

IRIS SOLUTIONS

Charlotte, N.C.

Years on list: 2020

OPTFINITY

Spring eld, Va.

Years on list: 2018, 2022

PEGASUS TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS

Frisco, Texas

Years on list: 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

STRONGHOLD DATA

Joplin, Mo.

Years on list: 2021, 2022

TECHSOLUTIONS

Wilmington, Del.

Years on list: 2019

TRITON NETWORKS

Dallas

Years on list: 2022

VISUAL EDGE IT

North Canton, Ohio

New to list

XCEPTIONAL

San Diego

New to list

Travis Thom CEO

Fuse Networks is focused on Azure Endpoint Management and Azure Virtual Desktops. There is less overhead to manage, faster deployment speeds and it is easier to consume for customers as an operating expense.

Shawn Torres CEO

Reggie Stevens CEO

In-Telecom Consulting sees its biggest opportunity as a blend between cybersecurity and digital trust. SMBs are falling victim to attacks that in many cases render them unable to do business or recover nancially. To combat this threat, it expects to see even more impressive technologies and strategies emerge, especially as more business owners grasp the true nature of the risk that a lack of basic essentials can mean.

Iris Solutions believes cloud and security will lead to more opportunities this year.

Michael Drobnis CEO

Opt nITy believes that cybersecurity and advanced tools to manage them are going to be the best opportunities this year.

Buck Jones Founder, CEO

Pegasus Technology Solutions is seeing as-a-service take hold in the market more and more, particularly Security as a Service. It is also seeing an increase in arti cial intelligence for operations and security. Companies are wanting insight into their data to make it usable for driving business decisions.

James Richards CEO

Rich Kenney Co-Founder, VP

Stronghold Data is focused on helping customers accomplish their business objectives, partially through helping them understand their data to impact their go-to-market strategies and be more e cient—moving past the technology stack only and really impacting their business’ capacity for growth and revenue.

An emerging trend Techsolutions sees as the biggest opportunity is using the rise of cyberinsurance policy questionnaires as a sales and revenue tool that helps customers understand the importance of utilizing more of its services to improve their security posture. Improving customers’ overall security posture is a huge opportunity in 2023.

Robert House CEO

Secure access service edge will be a key contributor to secure managed network services as the network and security continue to converge. Triton has been focused on security, cloud, virtual services and IoT for several years. The convergence of these areas continues to grow, and Triton is well positioned to take advantage of the market and opportunities that lie ahead.

Vanchieri

Secure access service edge is an emerging cybersecurity architecture that will be the future of network security in the cloud. SASE brings together both on-premises and remote workers under a common security policy, enhancing the enterprise’s security posture. This allows Visual Edge IT to apply secure access no matter where the customers’ users, applications or devices are located.

Chris McKewon

Everything as a Service is a growing trend within the market that Xceptional is capitalizing on. A large percentage of small and midsize customers are looking for cost-e ective and dynamic ways of consuming and utilizing IT operations, services, hardware and software, platforms and applications. Many customers are seeking utility-based pricing models, so Xceptional is continuing to expand its portfolio of managed services. This includes Security-as-a-Service and Compliance-as-a-Service o erings, which represent a massive market opportunity in 2023.

Managed Security 100

COMPANY/YEARS ON LIST

ASPIRE TECHNOLOGY PARTNERS

Eatontown, N.J.

Years on list:

2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

BEYONDID

San Francisco

New to list

CLOUDRISE

Grand Junction, Colo.

Years on list: 2022

COMPUTER TRANSITION SERVICES

Lubbock, Texas

Years on list:

2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

CONRES

Bedford, Mass.

Years on list:

2014, 2015, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

CYDERES

Kansas City, Mo. New to list

DIRECTDEFENSE

Englewood, Colo.

Years on list: 2017, 2021, 2022

NETFABRIC IT SOLUTIONS

Oklahoma City

Years on list: 2022

PROFICIO

Carlsbad, Calif.

Years on list: 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

SENTINEL TECHNOLOGIES

Downers Grove, Ill.

Years on list: 2014, 2015, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022

TOP EXECUTIVE

WHAT EMERGING TECHNOLOGY AREAS WILL BRING THE BIGGEST OPPORTUNITY THIS YEAR?

Cybersecurity lodged on SASE, zero trust and managed detection and response opportunities continue to expand as threats on the attack surface become stronger and more aggressive. Data applications, data protection and cloud security are getting more attention while managed detection and response will also thrive. IoT/OT for energy and utilities organizations is another area where Aspire sees potential growth, plus safety and security in transportation and manufacturing industries are a growing concern.

BeyondID sees passwordless authentication, identity proo ng, machine identity, consent and privacy management and zero trust as the key technology areas in 2023.

Cloudrise believes secure service edge solutions present the biggest opportunity in 2023 and for years to follow. Data targets have evolved over the past 20 years, and legacy point-solutions, such as data loss prevention, secure web and email gateways, and even cloud access security broker technologies cannot secure on-premises, in the cloud, and everyplace in between.

Michael Vaught SVP

Computer Transition Services sees cybersecurity as one of the largest opportunities for growth. With the threat landscape continuing to evolve, cybersecurity solutions such as zero trust, multifactor authentication, SIEM/SOC and threat detection are now necessities for business environmentss. Cloud services also continue to be more prevalent and necessary for businesses.

Mary Nardella CEO

Cybersecurity and cloud continue to be ConRes’ top focus areas. Its approach to cybersecurity puts customers’ entire IT infrastructure into focus from the cloud to the o ce to the edge. By identifying vulnerabilities early, designing end-to-end strategies and delivering layered security and incident response, it o ers a tailored approach to security that ts the customer’s business while reducing risk to the organization.

Robert Herjavec CEO

Jim Broome President, CTO

Cyderes sees cloud security tools, identity threat detection and response, arti cial intelligence/machine learning and automation as key in 2023.

Halcyon, an anti-ransomware and endpoint resilience platform built speci cally to stop ransomware, and cloud posture assessment technologies like Rapid7’s InsightCloudSec platform and CrowdStrike’s Cloud Workload Protection solution are the emerging technologies DirectDefense sees as o ering the biggest opportunities.

Netfabric sees arti cial intelligence in security services ITO as key, given the economic outlook.

Rick Karn CEO

Brad Taylor CEO

Brian Osborne Co-President, Chief Sales, Marketing O cer

Pro cio will be o ering services to companies migrating to cloud services, like AWS and Microsoft Azure, that require specialized MDR services. It also will be automating incident response for attacks and compromises.

Sentinel Technologies sees managed security solutions as a must.

Channel Chief View

Wrike Empowers Teams To Scale, Optimize And Move Fast

Q. What can you tell us about Wrike?

A. Wrike is the most powerful work management platform. Built for teams and organizations looking to collaborate, create and exceed expectations every day, Wrike brings work into a single place to remove complexity, increase productivity and free people up to focus on their most purposeful work.

With unmatched power, versatility and intuitiveness, Wrike is the only work management solution an organization will ever need to scale, optimize and move fast in a competitive world. More than 20,000 happy customers power their future and come together in Wrike, including Estée Lauder, Hootsuite, Nielsen, Ogilvy, Siemens and Tiffany & Co.

Q. What has led to Wrike’s success over the past year (in the channel)?

A. Our strategy in 2022 was to build the foundation to scale the channel. We focused on recruiting and activating the right partners to serve our core buyers, verticals and geographies. We built a highly repeatable and scalable partner recruitment and onboarding engine that helped us double our partners in six months and expand our ecosystem with high-quality partnerships. We rolled out certifications to further help our partners create more solutions with Wrike. As we built the foundation, we formed agreements with several marketplaces and solution partners that developed their solutions with Wrike. This value play was a core growth driver to Wrike in 2022.

Q. What role does the channel play at Wrike?

A. The channel helps Wrike scale efficiently across our core buyers, verticals and geographies. As we enter our next growth phase, the channel becomes increasingly important in unlocking value for customers through unique solutions that we develop together.

Q. Can Wrike integrate with other products?

A. Yes! Teams can automate entire workflows across their business with Wrike Integrate. Select from 400+ pre-built connectors to cloud and on-premises enterprise applications and sync Wrike to thousands more using universal connectors to apps with accessible APIs. Teams can choose to transfer and sync data among multiple apps in one or two directions or automate workflows by setting up triggers in apps that cause actions to automatically happen in other apps. Our workflow automation engine is very intuitive with a drag-anddrop interface that enables teams to set up workflows by connecting Wrike to apps without writing any code. This empowers teams to leverage prepackaged automated workflows, which contain predefined sets of triggers and actions across specific applications.

”

Built for teams and organizations looking to collaborate, create and exceed expectations every day, Wrike brings everyone and all work into a single place to remove complexity, increase productivity and free people up to focus on their most purposeful work.

Be Smart, Leave Politics To Politicians

IT DOESN’T MATTER if you are in sales, marketing, human resources or especially senior management, it never ever makes sense to weigh in on political issues either inside, or especially outside, your organization. Why is that? Because when it comes to work, your job is to advance the company’s position and help drive growth. Getting involved with political issues has too much potential to do the opposite.

In the case of senior management, succumbing to pressure among the masses of employees to weigh in on an issue of the day can have very damaging repercussions. And no one really cares what you think unless you are in total agreement with them. The best policy is to button it: Make it clear you are in the business of growing your business, and politics is a personal and unrelated distraction.

My argument comes from seeing it go wrong watching some in my own organization do so and certainly observing it go south publicly with others.

The best example is Disney’s debacle with the state of Florida, which resulted from its former CEO weighing in against a Florida Parental Rights in Education law, which didn’t sit well with some Disney employees. Disney, of course, picked a fight with a state that has granted it a very sweet special status that saved the company millions of dollars. That status is changing and not to Disney’s advantage. Was it worth it? Are shareholders happy?

I was at a sales dinner one evening with one of my senior-level sales leaders in which he told a customer what he thought of a particular presidential candidate in no uncertain terms. The dinner went south from there. The customer had a different opinion. We didn’t get the business. Not because we couldn’t help, but because someone should have known better and never opened his mouth. The customer wasn’t happy, and it hurt the business.

A few high-tech CEOs a few years back weighed in on a Georgia voting access law they disagreed with.

When it hit the press, I shook my head, thinking do they realize

that perhaps roughly 50 percent of their customers may disagree with them? Will feeling like you had to say something about the law be worth it if some of those customers’ decision-makers decide to look at other suppliers? All because you expressed your opinion on something that has nothing to do with your business?

Those examples are on weighing in outside of your four walls. But it can sting you even if you are in a position of power and you weigh in internally, as even the best intentions can go awry.

One executive weighed in innocently enough on the value of a historical civil rights leader and how his own company agreed with and emulated the same principles. Admirable? Perhaps. But within minutes the company’s internal message boards lit up accusing the individual and the company of not doing enough. Some of the attacks went beyond that and were inappropriate to say the least. Did it help advance the business?

My point in all this is we are heading into a presidential election cycle, and many people we meet in business will have strong opinions as to where things need to head.

But as individuals we need to remember we cannot control or truly influence what others do and think.

When it comes to business, our duty is to work toward helping our business perform at its best and maximize sales and growth. Getting into politics with a customer and often other employees always has the potential to go south. So why do it?

Yes, it’s true that politics affects us all personally and often our business as well. Be smart. Bite your tongue, and if you have to talk politics, do it with a very small group of trusted friends. But realize, they, just like customers, may not agree with you and just may think differently of you after everyone leaves the room. n

BACKTALK: Make something happen. Robert Faletra is a Founding Partner of The Channel Company. You can contact him via email at rfaletra@thechannelcompany.com.

MARCH

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SEPTEMBER

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Midsize Enterprise Summit: IT Security

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OCTOBER

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