AlienVault Signs Distribution Agreement with Westcon-Comstor, Details Partner Program Changes
Mere weeks into his new role as vice president of worldwide channel sales, Anthony D’Angelo is putting a stamp on AlienVault’s go-to-market strategy.
This week, the veteran channel sales specialist who joined AlienVault in December helped ink the company’s first global distribution deal with Westcon-Comstor, D’Angelo’s former employer. It covers the span of AlienVault’s Unified Security Management (USM) platform.
In addition to the new agreement, D’Angelo has been hard at work meeting with partners and developing plans that AlienVault will unveil later that are designed to make it easier and more profitable to partner with the fast-growing security management vendor. D’Angelo and his team are reviewing everything from onboarding to ease of ordering to marketing and beyond.
“We’re very focused on partner experience, so we are looking at improvements and enhancements that we can make to not only the program but the services we can wrap around it,” D’Angelo said.
As per the Westcon deal, D’Angelo says the new distribution agreement will provide AlienVault with global scale and reach, particularly in Europe and emerging market economies in the Middle East and Latin America.
“They have folks in-country in 70-plus nations and allow us to take care of partners locally and provide more support from a technical engineering perspective, from a services perspective and a marketing perspective,” he said in an interview with The VAR Guy.
As part of the deal, AlienVault joins Westcon’s global incubation program, which provides additional executive sponsorship, guidance and support for a select group of fast-growing innovators. As for additional distribution plans, D’Angelo does not expect to sign another global distributor anytime soon or withdraw from the existing relationships it has with other distribution companies. They are providing key services to target AlienVault partners, he insisted.
Speaking of which, D’Angelo said AlienVault is specifically recruiting “total solution partners” that resell, implement and then manage products and solutions.
“We have a solution that fits lots of different companies. It could be on-prem, managed or cloud. The more we can attract and target total solution providers that can sell across that model, the more we will be successful,” he said.
Going forward, managed services will become a bigger part of the company’s focus, and thus influence the ways in which the company restructures some of its partner programs. D’Angelo said AlienVault will prioritize “partner capabilities” that improve profitability, productivity and experience.
