Date: Sep 25, 2013 Author: Julia Talevski Source: (
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AccessData invests $6.5 million into building channel business
US-based security software vendor, AccessData is investing $6.5 million ($NZ 7.4 million) into its global channel business that will also include the A/NZ market.
In this region it is looking to recruit a number of enterprise partners with specific expertise in areas such as litigation on IP theft, criminal trials and cybercrime in enterprise and government sectors, also ones that have experience with handling deals valued up to $2 million.
AccessData vice-president of worldwide channel sales, Chad Gailey, said it had look at establishing a channel model in order to grow its business. The vendor has been around for about 25 years, selling direct and embarked on an indirect strategy about five years ago.
"About a year ago I came over from CA Technologies to expand AccessData's channel model, cover more geographies and customer segments," Gailey said. "The best way to expand geographically is through establishing a channel model."
AccessData will be investing in training programs, product development, learning management systems, marketing development funds, consultancy training, partner events and sales enablement collateral for resellers.
It has a partner program in place split into two tiers Elite and Preferred.
"When we set up the program about a year ago, we did a study on what our competitors and other software vendors were providing in the way of discounts to resellers and we added that, plus 10," Gailey, said. "We are going above and beyond what our competitors are doing in the way of discounts to make this a profitable product offering for our partners."
Partners are also offered access to pre-sales and technical support, as well as deal registration.
So far, AccessData has grown its channel team from three to eight worldwide, including hiring a full time channel sales manager covering A/NZ, Gareth Scott, last month. It has also increased its local head count to include technical, pre-sales and local account managers.
Across A/NZ it has 17 partners and some of its global partners include Dell, HP and IBM.
Gailey said in A/NZ 90 percent of its business will be through the channel.
"We're after value-add resellers and system integrators that are aggressively going after security type problems," he said.
