Over the coming 12 months it plans to triple its channel partners from 100 to 300, by recruiting a range of VARs, MSPs, network infrastructure providers, IT services and support companies. By utilising its UK-wide data centre and fibre network C4L says it will be able to offer the channel more cost effective solutions over ‘disparate traditional players’, thereby becoming a one-stop-shop for data centre and connectivity services. In addition, channel partners will be able to resell or white label a range of managed and cloud services.
“Businesses are increasingly looking for off-premise IT solutions to reduce costs, shrink the IT management burden and meet business needs faster. As a result the cloud computing, virtualisation and colocation markets are booming. Specifically, businesses are coming to us for offsite storage and virtual data centres. The truth is that they can’t cope with storing and protecting the sheer volume of data being created today and they increasingly need to provide access to this data from anywhere,” said Pete Hill, Partner Manager at C4L. “Typically resellers have had to go to different vendors for networking and data centre services, adding both cost and complexity to their sales and ultimately eroding margin. Not only are we a one-stop shop for these but we offer the channel a range of solutions, such as disaster recovery and VoIP, that they can layer on top of the core data centre and network services.”
Just recently, IDC predicted that the colocation market in France, Germany, the Netherlands and the U.K. combined will be worth almost £1,746 million in 2013. Traditionally, organisations have purchased colocation as a point product. However with C4L there is now the opportunity for resellers to pull together a more valuable, all encompassing solution for the customer. At the same time they can help the customer drive down costs by utilising C4L’s network, which offers free connectivity between data centres. By bundling together colocation with connectivity services to the data centre and then up-selling a range of managed services, the channel can very quickly build up a significant recurring revenue stream.
Through its channel programme C4L offers up to 30 percent margins on its vast portfolio of products and services. In addition to marketing support, where appropriate C4L will provide in-depth sales support working alongside its partners to deliver bespoke solutions. This gives the channel the confidence that, as well as selling C4L’s standard products, they can call upon the company to help design a tailored solution to meet the exact needs of their clients. C4L also has a great deal of experience in helping partners white label its services and quickly bring to market their own brand offerings.
“The channel clearly recognises that the future for reselling hardware is bleak; not only have margins been eroded but customers are increasingly looking at off-premise solutions. We can help channel partners transform themselves without making huge investments through our range of services,” said Pete Hill. “At the same time we can also help partners educate their customers on the need for extra resilience in a world where data has become all powerful and network connectivity is increasingly becoming the black spot in business continuity plans.”