CommVault urges partners to improve strategic consultancy

Held at Pennyhill Park, the CommVault UK Partner Forum explored the current landscape of the data management sector and provided evidence to support its stance that whilst businesses may have short term requirements to fulfil, taking the longer term approach to providing a robust solution will always deliver more value.

The sentiment was also echoed by keynote speaker Tony Lock, Programme Director at Analyst Group Freeform Dynamics. Lock argued that the challenges posed by ever increasing volumes of data - located everywhere and accessed via multiple devices - require a new way of thinking.
“New ways of working have led to higher expectations about data access but while companies are clear that they want to support initiatives like BYOD and tackle Big Data, there are still too few companies that have the basics right and they need expert help and guidance to make the necessary changes. They also need to maintain high availability of information that’s critical to business operations, ensure that information is brought back online quickly in the event of a systems failure, and archive historical data in an efficient, tamper-proof and easily accessible manner.”

“Multiple solutions to these problems just bring multiple headaches,” said Mark Johnson, UK & Ireland Channel Director at CommVault. “We believe that we can enable our channel partners to make a significant difference to the value they deliver to their customers by providing them with comprehensive training, empowering them with the right tools and ultimately supporting the sales cycle.”

Johnson suggested that a key issue to overcome in the first instance is that many organisations still want to keep all data close and are apprehensive about archiving due to potentially stumbling over recovery issues. “They need convincing,” he said.

In order to address this, CommVault is increasing its headcount to support a wider Global Channel Strategy, and will be introducing a more focused approach to its joint marketing, education and training programmes in order to help partners more confidently position Simpana as the data management solution that can drive real value from data - wherever it is in the business.

“We want our Partners to be able to differentiate themselves by offering a more agile, professional and consultative service,” Johnson continued. “That’s exactly why we established the EMEA Partner Enablement Centre in Reading, launched the Channel Enablement team & Partner University and extended the self-service capabilities of InnerVault, our centralised information and marketing resource for our Partners. We are seriously committed to the channel and are just as serious when we ask that partners now make a strong commitment to us.”