Channel partners looking to co-brand and co-manage multicloud data backup, recovery and monitoring for enterprise clients have a new option in HYCU’s cloud service provider program. The market for such a capability has grown as organizations worldwide use cloud platforms from more than one vendor.

For its part, HYCU, which broke off from Comtrade Group in early 2018, recently realized the need for a cloud service provider program; more customers were coming to the table with partners in tow.

HYCU’s Simon Taylor

“Millions of companies are using cloud, and all these cloud service providers have become the strongest channel for bringing cloud to market,” Simon Taylor, CEO of HYCU, told Channel Futures.

That activity started ramping up as HYCU perfected its Protégé platform. HYCU Protégé lets enterprises handle cross-cloud disaster recovery, data migration and application recovery for on-premises and public cloud providers –so far, Nutanix, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform and VMware – from one portal.

But a lot of organizations seeking those functions either team with, or cede responsibility to, partners. Because of that, HYCU saw the opportunity to expand its channel focus.

“Service providers we have been working with need a cloud-native solution that runs as a service and can be easily deployed and managed, and does not need additional resources or infrastructure to support,” Taylor explained in a June 15 press release.

Thus, on Monday, the vendor unveiled its cloud service provider program for partners who specialize in multicloud deployments — think cloud-centric managed service providers or similar models, not partners buying or renting at a discount and then rebranding. The latter fall under HYCU’s global partner program.

Breaking It Down

Taylor said the new initiative promises to drive “substantive value” for participants. Not only will they co-brand with HYCU, they will have extensive support along the way. For example, cloud service providers get the following:

Overall, said Subbiah Sundaram, vice president of products and marketing at HYCU, “we do three things. We help on the cloud journey, and we protect on-premises data and in the cloud.”

HYCU designed the new cloud service provider program accordingly. Joining bolsters partners’ efforts to get their clients into the cloud faster, reduces customer risk while moving to cloud, cuts down on partners’ operational expenses and provides instant differentiators without more investment, HYCU said.

HYCU boasts presence in more than 70 countries, so cloud MSPs across the globe have the opportunity to work with the company.

A Partner Testimonial

For Forthright Technology Partners, a Florida cloud MSP, teaming up as one of HYCU’s inaugural cloud service provider program participants made immediate sense.

“HYCU understands that cloud is all about pay-for-value,” Frank Merino, vice president of professional services, told Channel Futures. “With no upfront fees, we can turn on HYCU across multiple cloud instances [and] accounts, in minutes. In fact, not two hours ago we turned it up on another customer to address their data protection requirements for their entire farm. All I need to do is select HYCU in the [requisite vendor’s] marketplace and click a few options (frequency and retention), and their entire environment is now protected.”

Doing that with other cloud providers would mean …

… agreeing to upfront-licensing and, in many cases, provisioning a virtual appliance, Merino said. And that model doesn’t work anymore.

“In cloud, it’s about now,” Merino said. “Clients don’t want to outlay large sums of money to determine if a solution works for them. Or better yet, cloud-focused companies understand that all the systems they have in cloud can be there today and gone tomorrow. So having a solution that aligns with that model of working is important.”

HYCU gets it, he said.

“The best part for me has been the advisory services,” Merino said. “Having a helping hand is not something all [vendor] partners, as sad as that is, provide.”

Plus, he said, as backup and recovery grow more complex, vendors need to step up. These aspects of cloud are not always the sexiest part of technology, Merino noted. But they are “extremely important and often neglected.”

“HYCU removes all of that and provides a single place for physical, virtual and cloud systems. They also have object storage and continue to group into cloud-native technologies. These are the things that providers, and system admins alike, value.”

Multicloud Is the Future

ESG’s Christophe Bertrand

Indeed, HYCU’s embrace of cloud service providers comes as multicloud is “here to stay and will keep on growing in diversity, use cases and, of course, size,” Christophe Bertrand, senior analyst at Enterprise Strategy Group, wrote in a November 2019 whitepaper. “Data growth is not stopping anytime soon, only making the problem more acute,” adding that HYCU has solved this challenge with Protégé and its “data protection as a service” approach.

Importantly, current HYCU global partner program members need not feel left out. HYCU has expanded that piece of its channel strategy to include multicloud as well. Now, in addition to getting pay from cloud providers, these partners also get direct incentives from HYCU. As a result, HYCU said it has simplified the deal registration process across all tiers.