Cisco Channel Leader: 'Cisco Is Switzerland In Terms Of Cloud'
Cisco channel leader Nirav Sheth said partners should be pumped that the network leader's cloud vision and strategy are "coming to fruition."
"Customers are consuming all kinds of clouds, on-premise, off-premise – they have workloads everywhere," said Sheth, vice president of partner solutions, architectures and engineering for Cisco's Global Partner Organization, in an interview with CRN at the Cisco Partner Summit 2017. "So, really, from a partner lens, they should understand that Cisco is Switzerland in terms of cloud. No matter where the workload resides, our partners can trust us that we're going to make them and our customers successful across an entire stack."
The 17-year Cisco veteran is responsible for the networking giant's partner enablement, technology strategy and helping the channel develop practice capabilities.
At Partner Summit last week, Cisco unveiled several new cloud solutions and channel incentives, including a partnership with ConnectWise to create a solution that enables MSPs to monitor and manage Cisco's cloud-based networking portfolio from a single program.
ConnectWise Unite with Cisco is a new managed services software that combines Cisco Spark, Meraki, Cisco Umbrella and Stealthwatch Cloud under a single interface.
"It's a great opportunity for our partners to lead truly with an end-to-end Cisco platform – networks, security, collaboration and cloud, and deliver that as a one-stop shop for their end customers," said Sheth.
Sheth said partners could also leverage Cisco Capital Easy Pay to the new solution providing a subscription-based payment option for the channel.
"[Partners] can basically just leverage the Easy Pay capability that we're rolling out to mirror the portfolio that will be with ConnectWise, and basically pay us by the month. So as they're billing out by the month, they're paying us by month," said Sheth. "So it's truly a Cisco platform as a subscription experience."