Ashish Taneja, Channel Lead, Lenovo Datacenter group(DCG) shares insight about the channel engagements and key directions for 2020
What have been the key highlights of 2019 and how will 2020 be an important year for the IT channel industry?
From a technology standpoint, 2019 has been an innovative year for the IT channel industry. There has been a strong focus on equipping the channel with tech-enabled tools and preparing them for Intelligent Transformation. Lenovo believes that the three key building blocks for Intelligent Transformation lie in data, computing power, and algorithms.
With this in mind, we have invested in AI and machine learning, 5G and placed a premium on connected devices from the edge to the core – and are educating our channel partners on the potential of these technologies through webinars and multiple training programs.
We are committed to elevating our partners’ experience, productivity, and profitability. In 2020, we will continue to offer technology solutions and portfolios designed especially for our channel partners.
Can you tell top three technology trends that channel community should be betting for and why?
For our channel community, Intelligent Transformation driven by three distinct, but related areas will be a top trend this year:
Smart Internet of Things (SIoT): Creating the widest array of smart devices and at scale.
Smart Infrastructure: Providing the foundation for computing, storage, and networking power to support intelligence. We started with traditional data centers, software-defined, hyperscale, and high-performance computing. With new technological changes, we are moving to newer, service-led offerings.
Smart Verticals: SIoT devices combined with the Smart Infrastructure help understand the data and enable us to provide new insights that enhance our customers’ decision-making processes, across a range of verticals including smart retail, smart manufacturing, smart healthcare, and more.
What are the top channel directions your company has set for your partners and where should partners invest to be aligned to these directions?
Our channel partners are the epicentre of Lenovo’s go-to-market strategy. We provide maximum support to improve the performance of our channel partners and create a seamless relationship with them. Our channel strategy comprises of two key initiatives:
Digital Campaign Studio: This is a self-service, demand generation tool, introduced in 2019. This year, we plan to help our partners leverage it even better. The zero cost, digital marketing tool takes care of the lead management system, helping partners manage and extract high-quality leads generated from previous campaigns. It also eliminates heavy lifting and complexity by creating and deploying marketing campaigns quickly, enabling partners to reach a broad audience and generate more leads with minimal investment, resources, and upskilling on their part.
Critical enablers: To empower our channel partners and gear them towards high-performance and growth, we’ve also introduced ‘critical enablers’. These are tools such as the New Partner Digital CAMs (Channel Account Managers) and the Partner Pricing Recommender which help our partners reduce friction in the selling process. We also plan to make strategic investments to fulfil our vision of ‘Intelligent Transformation’ and ‘smarter technology for all’, such that all partners have access to technology they need.
To conclude, emerging technologies present immense opportunities for all types of businesses to optimize business processes and create big impact. We’ve always, and will continue to encourage all our channel partners to take a lead and be early adopters. To help them take the leap forward, we will continue enabling our channel partners in their journey towards innovation, opportunity, and growth.
