Cloud Migration Scale on Demand Thought Leadership VMware Cloud on AWS

Partner Services Opportunities and Incentives for VMware Cloud on AWS

Enterprise customers and their workloads continue to leverage the cloud for a number of use cases including: migration of workloads, data center extension, disaster recovery, and building next-gen applications. A recent Gartner projection estimated that the cloud market will hit $206 billion in 2019 up from $175 billion in 2018 and $145 billion in 2017. For a lot of businesses, a hybrid cloud is proving to be an effective balance between leveraging their on-premise investments in technologies, skillsets, and combining this with the operating expense flexibility and agility that cloud offers. This is at the core of the VMware Cloud on AWS value proposition as it helps customers accelerate their hybrid cloud journey by providing them with consistent infrastructure and operations.

What’s in it for Partners?

Services oriented partners have a significant role to play in enabling enterprises achieve their vision of hybrid cloud. These service opportunities range from advisory services to professional services to managed services. As enterprises accelerate their journey to hybrid cloud, 86% plan to use cloud professional services from either their cloud vendor or a third party system integrator. In addition, according to Market and Markets the cloud managed services market size is projected to grow from $27 billion in 2017 to $54 billion by 2022, at an expected CAGR of 15%.

VMware partners have played a critical role in the success of both customers and of VMware. For VMware Cloud on AWS, partners can help in the following ways:

  • Maximize customer investments and reduce risk
  • Accelerate time to value of VMware Cloud on AWS
  • Leverage their unique services to address customer ‘use cases’

The figure below from an IDC White Paper shows the partner business opportunity for VMware Cloud on AWS growing to >$3B in 2022 at a compounded annual growth rate of 94%. This detailed study by IDC may be accessed through this registration link: IDC White Paper.

 

 

Partner Offerings for VMWare Cloud on AWS

In March 2018, VMware expanded the solution provider program and VMware Cloud Provider Program (VCPP) to include VMware cloud on AWS. These programs outline partner requirements and benefits to transact VMware Cloud on AWS. In addition, VMware launched a solution competency that provides the sales and technical training that partners need to be successful at transacting VMware Cloud on AWS. More details about these programs are provided in the figure below.

 

 

Overview of Partner Incentives for VMware Cloud on AWS

Partner incentives for VMware Cloud on AWS are oriented to help solve customer use cases through value-added services which in turn drive consumption of VMware Cloud on AWS; resulting in a win-win-win for the customer, partner, and VMware. For example, partners that transact through the solution provider go-to-market (GTM) model receive a range of benefits. These include an incentive for enterprise license agreement (ELA) registrations, are eligible for a channel discount, and a significant incentive for driving post-sales consumption of VMWare Cloud on AWS through value-added professional services that can be monetized separately. In order to be eligible for the consumption incentive, partners must complete the VMware Cloud on AWS solution competency, be nominated by the customer as their partner of record, and submit a consumption plan that outlines the customer use case and the value-added services they plan to deliver. Partners that transact through the VCPP GTM model deliver value-added managed services to customers. New partners that transact through this GTM model benefit from volume discounts proportional to their commit levels of VMware Cloud on AWS capacity. Existing partners that transact through VCPP GTM model have the flexibility to leverage their existing commit contracts to test out demand before entering into a commit contract exclusively focused on VMware Cloud on AWS. The figure below outlines the partners roles, responsibilities, and opportunities for the two GTM models discussed.

 

 

VMware Cloud on AWS Resources for Services Partners

VMware has continued to update its partner programs with new trainings made available for partners. The VMware Cloud Sales Institute, Solution Enablement Toolkits, and Partner Acceleration Program provide additional resources that enable partners to sell and deliver hybrid cloud services. More information on these trainings can be found on this blog and on Partner Central.

Partners will have access to additional technical and sales training at EMPOWER, VMware’s elite partner event of the year scheduled in April and May 2019.

Summary

Services oriented partners with the ability to deliver value-added services that drive consumption of VMWare Cloud on AWS have a significant opportunity both from the VMware Partner Program incentives and through monetization of advisory, professional, and managed services.

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