Ciena’s Jay Jadeja Takes On New Role as Company Gives Partner Network a Refresh

Ciena recently launched their updated partner program, which is leading with an “ecosystem” model. The company sought to evolve its Ciena Partner Network to be more closely tied to its sales motion, according to sources. 

Ciena’s Jay Jadeja

With this revamp comes a rather important personnel evolution. Jay Jadeja, previously senior director of partner programs, is moving into a new role to focus on GCNs and building Ciena’s marketplace strategy. Jadeja, a Channel Futures’ 2022 Circle of Excellence winner, still reports directly to Matt Cook.

Focus and Goals

Jadeja has been working on evolving the Ciena partner program for five years. In his new role, he will be focusing on expanding Ciena’s channel offerings. As the company launched the updated ecosystem program, he was asked to help with some of the go to market elements. Linda Hutchinson will be taking over the programs team at Ciena in an expansion of her Global Resell business development role.

“What we’re envisioning is that from a strategic cloud providers perspective, we’re seeing them become more and more important from a data center standpoint,” Jadeja told Channel Futures. “The marketplace is being more integrated for the channel as well, so we’re seeing that as a really big area of focus. My goal moving forward is to review the content providers and the partnering strategy in particular. And, to really help Ciena capitalize on that market opportunity that we see.”

Looking Ahead

Jadeja plans to help the partner organization and Ciena look at these different elements. Specifically from a partner focus, in order to expand. 

“I was looking at some of the things that we were doing previously,” said Jadeja. “We’ve been talking about new users application, endless content, demand connectivity. We’ve also been talking about having the metro and the edge already from a company perspective. As we build that out, we’re focused on how the partner strategy is being more and more aligned. From an ecosystem perspective, it’s a really good collaboration now to have the program in place. And, also to go to market.”

From his side, Jadeja describes himself as one pillar of all of this.

“There is an alliances function, a carrier managed services function, and a business development on the broadband function as well. So, it’s really aligning both of those sections together.”