Dell Technologies Reveals New Tier Thresholds That Some Partners Find 'Challenging'
Dell EMC revealed new revenue thresholds for partners hoping to keep their tier status intact in 2018, including a $50 million minimum for Titanium partners selling a single product line and a $25 million minimum for those selling multiple product lines.
"That $25 million is going to be challenging for a lot of partners," said Mark McKeever, principal at MicroAge, a Tempe, Ariz., solution provider and Dell Titanium partner. "It's going to be tough for a lot of people, maybe not legacy EMC partners."
McKeever said MicroAge is currently bringing in around $20 million to $25 million in Dell Technologies revenues. "We're going to have to make sure we're really on it these next few months and finish strong in Dell's fiscal fourth quarter (ending Feb. 2)."
For partners selling a single product line, the minimum revenue threshold to keep Platinum status is $25 million and $5 million for Gold. Partners selling two or more product lines will need to generate a minimum of $15 million in sales for Platinum status and $500,000 for Gold.
Scott Winslow, president of Winslow Technology Group, a Waltham, Mass. solution provider and Dell Titanium partner, said the vendor earlier this year gave channel partners a range of between $25 million to $50 million in revenues to keep Titanium status next year.
"I think $25 million for partners selling multiple lines of businesses is a good number," said Winslow. "If they had chosen $50 million for example -- there's not a lot of partners that could hit that."
Winslow was also excited to learn about Dell's new tier protection program for partners who are "all-in" with Dell EMC. For partners exclusively selling Dell EMC storage, networking and server product lines, the solution provider will have tier status protect in 2018.
"Partners who are all-in, exclusive to Dell EMC selling more LOBs, attaching services and on a path to complete the training requirement, will receive tier protection," said Kimberley DeLeon, vice president of Global Channel Programs for Dell Technologies, during a webcast on Wednesday. "This is huge."
Winslow said the protection is "critical" for some partners trying to achieve and maintain top-tier status.
"Dell is rewarding us by saying, 'If your all-in, we're going to take all those partners, and you're going to be status-matched for next year.' That means for us and other partners, we're going to be Titanium again in 2018," said Winslow. "They're going to reward those partners, even if we're not the largest partners."
DeLeon said the new single revenue thresholds ensure that partners have the flexibility of how they obtain their tier status. Partner have until Feb. 2 to generate sales that will be counted toward tier status in 2018, according to DeLeon. The deadline for completing training competences is Dec. 31, 2017.
In October, Dell cut its services revenue requirement in half for its Titanium-level partners, bringing the annual services revenue requirement down to $3 million from $6 million.
It's been a busy week for Dell EMC. The vendor launched two new all-flash SC block storage arrays on Tuesday as well as a new Future-Proof Storage Loyalty Program giving customers a three-year money-back guarantee, as well as trade-in credits toward new Dell EMC storage products, to name a few features.
Dell EMC channel chief John Byrne was bullish during the webcast about the future of the channel.
"We want to be number one -- the biggest and best channel partner with you around the world," said Byrne. "We have a lot of share wallet to grab. We have room to grow. There's a whole lot of money out there for us all to make, and we are not slowing down."