GEC NEWS WIREWestcon is all set to take the security market by a tide with its recent partnership with Aruba. Westcon is adding considerable value to its existing portfolio of leading security solutions. As a partner, Westcon will distribute Aruba’s portfolio of access management, network infrastructure and mobile engagement solutions through its extensive network of resellers and sis across these regions and further strengthens its position as the market-leading Security and Networking distributor in the Middle East. Steve Lockie, Group managing director – Westcon and Osama Alhaj-Issa?, Channel Director, Middle East and Turkey -Aruba share their respective views on this valuable partnership.
Steve Lockie, Group managing director
Westcon
“We don’t brand Westcon very much at all. We rather promote our vendor partner and we work in conjunction with our reseller partner to develop things.”
Osama Alhaj-Issa?, Channel Director,
Middle East and Turkey – Aruba
“Mobility world is still at the beginning, and we believe Westcon has moved at the right time to bridge this gap.”Tell us about the event today.
Steve – The event was launching the new partnership across the ME region. The event was to show that Westcon Security offers a wide solutions portfolio and has a wide eco system of partners that we are working with to build truly secure network and mobile solution. Also to allay any fears on the forthcoming acquisition and Aruba is going to be a significant opportunity for resellers in the region. The acquisition strengthens the partnership because it gives us a full solution to take to the market, rather than just being the secure wireless offering, we actually now have a full solution offering.
Osama – Aruba is known for mobility and secure mobility solutions, and once the merger is closed, we will certainly have the complete end to end solution for Infrastructure networking and this is something that the market takes very positively. The feedback from our channel, distribution and partners is also very positive, and it’s an exciting time for us. We believe that we can do a lot more in terms of business than what we have been doing before.
How will the acquisition affect regional market share?
Osama – It will positively affect our regional market share – it will get more market share since we have an enhanced portfolio, and there are some statistics in our market share in wireless LAN, our portfolio in switching and combining these together will be a powerful market share.
Tell me about your product roadmap
Osama –Since we are merging two division – HP Networking with Aruba Networking, the best of the products will continue, and the top technology and the go to market that is based in both companies will continue. Aruba’s research will continue to take place with the backing we will receive from HP; certainly we will be investing more in research and getting better products for our customers.
Steve – In terms of the Westcon portfolio that we’ve built over the last few years, we have a strong security portfolio. However with the changing environment of the mobile work space, we really did have a big hole, and that was providing secure mobile access. So by partnering with Aruba, we think we’ve significantly bridged the gap and by partnering with the eco-system vendors as well, we have some great solutions now. There is more opportunity for the resellers to go out and sell to the new mobile environments with very secure integrated offerings, right down to the mobile devices.
What is your opinion on the rising number of mobile devices?
Osama- Taking about mobile devices and tablets, there is still growth and although it is rising, we are still at the beginning of the growth curve, so the reality and opportunity is that the mobility world is still at the beginning, and we believe Westcon has moved at the right time to bridge this gap with this partnership and there is a big role we will play together to fill this gap and serve the mobility market.
Steve– These mobile devices are every CIO’s worst nightmare with all the various malwares that could breach the network. So, to have a truly integrated secure wireless is essential, and it is not possible to achieve with any one vendor –it takes these best of breed vendors and putting them together to do that.
Are there any particular verticals you are targeting with Aruba?
Steve – We are not restricted by a lack of opportunities. We are very strong within Westcon because of some of our heritage in transport & logistics, retail, education, and indeed Aruba have their own vertical practices. So what we are trying to do now is align with the partners by vertical to understand which partner is addressing which part of the market and build those very structured vertical go-to-market partners and work together on it.
What’s next for Aruba?
Osama- Today we are enjoying the benefits 802.11 AC wave 1 devices, and supporting technology from Aruba. And in the coming few weeks will announce wave 2 of – 802.11 AC, which is a very promising technology. With that we will start seeing mobile devices and tablets and laptops that support that technology, so we are coming early with Wave 2; we always do that ahead of our competition, and this will create a revolution it the world of communication and networking because of the amount of the data that you can move, because of the coverage and distance that can be reached, and because of the strength of the signal that it can provide. The wave 2 of 802.11 AC will be a very exciting technology, and I expect this to start materializing especially with supporting devices, in 6 months time, but we are ready now.
Who are Westcon’s resellers and what’s your target market for Q2 and Q3?
Steve-As Westcon, we don’t have the same database as other distributors, and what we don’t try to do is serve 5000 reseller, so what we try to focus on by division – whether it’s Comstor, Westcon Security, Westcon UCC. Of course we have partners with whom we have an agreed business plan and agreed metrics, and we’ll understand the challenges of our vendors, then identify partners, and have specific programs that develop those partners, including marketing as a service, and other things that will deliver that. Perhaps our fastest growing sector at the moment is the solutions providers, and the global systems integrators, the service provider community etc. We are seeing more people offering wireless-as-a-service or secure wireless access as a service, so we are changing our portfolio and offerings to allow the reseller to address the market, including the finance offering, for instance. As consumption models change in the market, we are evolving our role as distributors even to address cloud offerings. There’s a lot going on and because of that, we try and keep to a very structured channel program, with a finite number of partners that we measure and review quarterly with our primary vendors, and Aruba is certainly one of those.
What are Westcon’s marketing strategies for the ME?
Steve- Instead of branding ourselves, we rather promote our vendor partners and we work in conjunction with our reseller partners to develop things. Our marketing dollars are spent around recruiting, enabling, and growing, our reseller’s capability. In terms of end-user demand creation, we tend to shy away from doing any direct end-user events, because we then come into conflict as we introduce a reseller to an end –user, as many resellers feel they are incumbent in many end-users. Rather we take a reseller, understand their vendor plan in that market, we then plan events with that reseller to their end-users, executive briefings, marketing collateral for vendors, e-mailers, electronic campaigns, telemarketing campaigns. Everything we do links back to ROI. We are proud to say that even when there are discretional funds with our vendors, we tend to get the lion’s share of that because we do provide that ROI back to the vendor.
What are Westcon’s target markets and verticals for 2015?
Steve-The largest areas of growth, the classic VAR base continues to grow, these net new channels are what excite us, because for our vendor partners there are only so many resellers they can go out to. Now the technologies are there where people are more comfortable to deploy mobile application to give people access to internet in their store, now is the chance to take that to the next level – monitoring the opportunity, looking at analytics to then pay back to the organization, and this is how the network is actually putting profit back into your company; rather than being a piece of essential CAPEX, its actually core to the operations and marketing of the business.
