Q&A BEN BOSWELL
ENGAGING CUSTOMERS
With global revenues of $11 billion, WWT is a channel giant, European VP, Ben Boswell,
spoke to TBT about their accelerated growth since they launched in the UK six years ago
TBT: What do you see as the main
challenges facing the channel today?
BB: There are a variety of different
players including telecoms service
providers, systems integrators, and
value-added resellers in the channel
space. The challenge is being able to
help customers shorten the evaluation
process and understand business goals,
rather than just purchasing the products
which could potentially cannibalise
their own business by allowing
customers to take advantage of hybrid
IT options.
Companies must simplify
architectural standards into
standardised configurations to be able
to pinpoint different service lines as
opposed to a particular technology:
campus and factory infrastructure, for
example, should not be approached
in the same way. WWT provides
a minimal viable product from an
architectural standpoint so companies
can standardise small, medium and
large offerings and build reference
architecture to meet the service level
they’d like to deliver.
This involves taking advantage
of technology such as SD-WAN,
automation and orchestration by
packaging them into reference
architectures that can then be used to
provide solutions on a site-by-site basis.
This simplifies the change management
process by eliminating the need to
investigate each siloed technology.
TBT: How does a company the size
of WWT differentiate itself in an
increasingly crowded market?
BB: As companies look to optimise
consumption models such as cloud
within their own datacentres, they’ve
found that there aren’t enough partners
able to provide the proficient tech
and business outlooks. Essentially
these partners are unable to combine
both tech and business in order to
enable digital change. Companies
are struggling to achieve base level
infrastructure capabilities needed to
optimise collaboration technology
because their legacy infrastructure
is too complicated to alter. Partner
ecosystems do not want to initiate this
change as they’ve leveraged service
organisations that are profiting from the
legacy infrastructure.
In such a crowded market, WWT
simplifies the complexity of the
existing infrastructure, helping to drive
technology integration by reducing the
time spent on reviewing the multitude of
available options. In addition, being able
to sign up to a dev-ops approach in the
way WWT drives transformation across
high and low level is an essential market
differentiator.
TBT: The IT procurement landscape is
changing. How can partners adapt
their engagement with customers
accordingly?
BB: In procurement, consolidating
the supply chain, strategic sourcing
initiatives, vendor consolidation
and big RFPs were previously the
core focus, but now the industry is
moving towards leveraging a more
consumption based model. The
traditional RFP type approach is too
slow to execute, and procurement
must be strategic in the decision
making process with much shorter
time frames.
WWT’s ecosystem has invested
in knowing exactly how to simplify
and produce proven reference
architectures and minimising the
impact on the IT organisations who
are buying ready-made ‘packages’. As
customers adopt more cloud models
in procurement, WWT can drive the
adoption and consumption of large
enterprise and cloud agreements,
which are the commercial vehicles
that will drive transformation.
TBT: Are there any ways you think
vendors could be better at adapting
to this new channel landscape?
BB: OEMs are desperate for partners
to add incremental value to their
offerings; recognising that it’s a
diverse environment and customers
want outcomes. The most successful
OEMs will be the ones engaging
with partner ecosystems that are
driving synergies across a customers’
ecosystem. Developing specific
vertical solutions that fit the horizontal
product portfolio but also increase its
relevancy to specific sector such as
retail is key, but can only be done by a
handful of current channel partners.
TBT: What’s the most exciting thing
you’re seeing in the IT market today?
BB: There is a new kind of leadership
appearing in customers – they have
secured the budget and mandate
for change yet are actually focused
on execution. In order to drive
transformation they need an internal
and external network to help break
the status quo around technological
change.
“WWT’s ecosystem has
invested in knowing
exactly how to simplify
and produce proven
reference architectures
and minimising the impact
on the IT organisations
who are buying readymade
‘packages’”
www.technologybusinesstoday.24 com April 2019
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