After the announcement of its new channel strategy and promise to stay 100 per cent channel committed, Sophos, an Oxford, U.K.-based IT security and control solution provider, is expanding its North American market presence with the recent implementation of its revised channel model.
Chris Doggett, director of channel sales at Sophos, says the company currently has about 900 Canadian partners. The partners, he explains, are categorized under one of three tiers in its partner program, which includes platinum, gold and silver levels.
“We put a lot of emphasis on our top two tiers,” Doggett says. “We maximize on this; this is what we call the bi-directional market model. The silver tier is our group of authorized resellers and with them, we tend to be more reactive than proactive.”
Being in the platinum or gold levels allows partners to receive higher margins and more protection for their business, Doggett says.
Michael Rogers, vice-president of North America, alliance, channel and OEM sales at Sophos, explains the company was founded in the U.K. and only came to the U.S. market 10 years ago. Today, Sophos has headquarters in both Oxford, U.K. as well as in Boston. The company offers a range of antivirus, anti-spyware and other security-related products that are designed for the small to large-sized enterprise markets.
“Globally, we’re in the range of about 4000 to 7000 partners,” Rogers said. “The U.K. has more history so there’s more concentration [of partners] there. Sophos has been very strong in the education, government, financial and corporate sectors. We also have a focus on the enterprise market space.”
Doggett says Sophos guarantees margins for partners through its opportunity registration program. Under this program, margins typically range from 12 to 18 per cent and if a deal were to be lost to another partner, Sophos will still guarantee partners a seven per cent margin.
“We want our partners to be protected with their margins,” Doggett explains. “We want partners to know that regardless of the deal, they’ll be paid.”
In addition to Sophos’s opportunity registration program, the company also has a set of standard margins and order fulfillment margins for partners. Doggett says depending on which tier the partner is in, margins can range anywhere between 20 to 30 per cent.
“Anyone involved late in the deployment process is placed under the order fulfillment margin,” Doggett said. “These margins range from 12 per cent all the way down to three per cent. But no matter what tier you’re in, it doesn’t really matter. The margins are still accessible to partners who still may not be that committed yet.”
Softchoice Corp., a Toronto-based large account reseller, is just one of Sophos’s many Canadian partners. Tema Mueller, director of security, storage and software solutions at Softchoice, says it was Sophos’s channel commitment that led to the company partnering up with them.
“We feel that Sophos has a really good technology and their commitment to the channel is what interested us the most,” Mueller said.
Mueller says Softchoice has seen more leads come through since Sophos revamped its channel model and strategy six months ago.
“Sophos is still an emerging security vendor for us,” Mueller says.
“We still have a strong relationship with the other vendors we work with like Symantec. But for us, it’s about driving more security solutions in the field. Our focus is on the customer and solving their solution needs, whether it’s through Sophos, Symantec or McAfee products.”