As our portfolio of services continues to grow through service innovation and development, as well as through acquisition, notably CSI, partners have a unique opportunity to grow with us. I believe the future is bright for both Park Place Technologies and our partners. TR: In what areas are you experiencing strongest demand? IA: Within the last 12 months, we have seen huge demand for alternative technical support for VMware products and technologies, driven by the changes implemented by Broadcom. While interest is dipping, as VMware users have largely made up their mind on sticking with VMware or migrating to an alternative provider, we have nevertheless grown our Technical Software Support portfolio, which now also includes alternative software support for IBM AIX, Dell VxRail, Microsoft, Nutanix and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). Liquid Cooling is gaining interest, as organisations are doing their due diligence and discovery on the various liquid cooling technologies in the market, and our core infrastructure services continue to see steady demand, globally. Ongoing global economic and political uncertainty will lead many organisations to postpone new purchases and require longer curation of IT assets, which could also impact demand for third-party optimisation services. TR: What recent wins are you most proud of? IA: One win which stands-out is a panEuropean Network Managed Services contract on behalf of a large MSP. This win demonstrates how we help partners fill their service delivery gaps with our global reach, spares inventory, logistics planning and Field Engineers located throughout the globe, ready to be deployed to support our partners and their customers. TR: Where is business proving most difficult? IA: One area that’s proving challenging in the partner space is the increasing influence of OEMs. OEMs are trying to control how partners choose the best service solution for their customers, despite third-party maintenance providers software, CSI helps medium-to-large enterprises in highly regulated industries modernise their systems, applications, processes and underlying IT architectures and embrace hybrid cloud solutions. At the beginning of June, Park Place Technologies piloted a new partner enablement initiative by giving Sofcat’s sales and support teams access to hundreds of training courses via its internal training portal, Uptime Academy Here, Ian Anderson, Senior Director of Partner Sales EMEA, gives his view from the channel. Technology Reseller (TR): How’s business? Better or worse than 12 months ago? And how confident are you about the future? Ian Anderson (IA): Business continues to grow as we further establish and grow our channel business. Over the last 12 months, I like to think that we have continued to raise our profile and boost awareness of the value we bring to the channel, including how we can help partners grow their business by partnering with us for IT infrastructure services and help their customers solve their pain points. We continue to invest in our channel partners and the wider channel ecosystem, examples of which include the creation and establishment of our Annual Partner Awards, Partner Briefings throughout the year and our Partner Advisory Board. In addition, we have developed an online academy for partners to be trained in promoting our services to their customers. Park Place Technologies provides a wide range of products and services, directly and via thousands of channel partners, to 21,500 customers in the US, EMEA, APAC and LATAM. These include third party data centre and network hardware maintenance & software support, IT professional services, and IT infrastructure managed services powered by what Park Place Technologies claims is the world’s largest on-the-ground engineering team and a global network of Enterprise Operations Centres. In addition to hardware maintenance and professional services, Park Place Technologies sells new and pre-owned IT equipment, Entuity network monitoring and management software and liquid cooling solutions for datacentres. In May, the portfolio company of Charlesbank Capital Partners and GTCR boosted Park Place Technologies’ managed services capability and advanced its vision of becoming the world’s most comprehensive, customer-focused IT lifecycle partner by acquiring CSI Ltd, a UK-headquartered MSP specialising in hybrid multi-cloud solutions for legacy IBM systems. With technical expertise across IBM Power Systems, storage solutions and View from the Channel With Ian Anderson, Senior Director of Partner Sales EMEA at Park Place Technologies. View from the Channel Ian Anderson Liquid Cooling is gaining interest, as organisations are doing their due diligence and discovery on the various liquid cooling technologies in the market 14
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NDUxNDM=