Global telecommunications provider, Verizon, has taken its biggest step towards maturity in the Australian channel, after signing cloud integrator, HubOne, to its partner program.
In developing software for small and medium sized accounting firms to run in the cloud, the Sydney-based company comes on board following the launch of Verizon’s Asia Pacific Partner Program in March.
HubOne CEO, Nick Beaugeard, told ARN that when Verizon initially made advances, he remained sceptical because of the vendor’s reputation as an enterprise player.
“They spent a while working with us and asked us what we would want to come on board as a partner,” he explained.
“I said I wanted the network to be as reliable as a Verizon enterprise network, but I want it to be charged on a price per user per month basis, and I want no lock in contract.”
Despite hesitancy at first, the multinational giant - which posted $US131.6 billion in revenue during 2015 - came on board and agreed to Beaugeard’s terms and conditions.
“We’re actually able to deliver our offering across the world on a Verizon network to small and medium accounting firms,” he said. “It’s like dealing with a telco who is agile, which is something I’ve never seen before.
“It’s the new business model around price per user per month, which is pretty attractive to the customer.
“For an organisation such as Verizon to actually sit and listen, and do what we asked, has been fantastic.”
The Verizon Partner Program tailors regional and national opportunities for systems integrators, value added resellers, agents and solutions providers, designed to accelerate delivery and adoption of solutions for meeting medium business requirements.
In addition, the program features a tiered benefits structure that allows partners the flexibility to determine levels of commitment.
“The gold standard is the Microsoft partner program but Verizon are coming a close second,” Beaugeard added.
“A significant number of our small and medium business customers are on the cusp of digital transformation and being named to the Verizon Partner Program will now give them the added benefit of access to some of the industry’s most innovative offerings.
“In addition, having recently been chosen as the first Australian integrator of Microsoft’s latest enterprise cloud-based package allows us to continue to approach the Australian marketplace with a renewed vigour.”
Beaugeard told ARN that the entire consultation process took “about six months”, having worked closely with Verizon Australia channel lead, Sharmilla Gosai, who helped expedite the process.
“Not only can we sell it direct but we can also sell it through partner as well so our partner channel is actually benefiting from the relationship too,” he added.
Currently, Beaugeard revealed that HubOne already has ten customers signed up, with five channel partners transacting.
For Beaugeard, because HubOne’s customer base is cloud-based, the partnership allows the company to offer a single internet connection and within that, multiple interconnects to all major public cloud providers such as Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and IBM Softlayer.
“The customers and partners get the best of on-premise with cloud through the SCI secure interconnect,” he added.
