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Cisco Partners to Fuel Global Development and Delivery of Managed Services
New Program Combines Partner Incentives With Proven Cisco Powered Framework, Creating the IT Industry's First Global Managed Services Channel Program
| Source: Cisco Systems, Inc.
SAN JOSE, CA--(Marketwire - October 31, 2007) - In a continuing effort to extend and
accelerate the global development and delivery of innovative managed
services based on advanced networking technologies as well as IP
Next-Generation Networks, Cisco® (NASDAQ : CSCO ) today announced the new
Cisco Managed Services Channel Program.
The Cisco Managed Services Channel Program is the industry's first global
managed services channel program designed to incentivize partners to
deliver a wide spectrum of managed services. This innovative global program
integrates the recently enhanced Cisco Powered Program framework, enabling
partners to accelerate the global development and delivery of managed
services.
"Growth in the managed services market will continue to outpace IT industry
growth as customers strive to reduce complexity, decrease risk and improve
time to market," said Edison Peres, vice president of Worldwide Channels at
Cisco. "Based on a consistent, global framework, the Cisco Managed Services
Channel Program will allow regional channel partners, service providers and
systems integrators to more easily meet our customers' growing demand for
managed services in established and emerging markets."
The Managed Service Partner Program serves to drive global consistency
through predictable offerings and in-country product access. The program
gives partners tools to offer consistent services to global customers based
on the customers' business requirements. In addition, the Managed Services
Channel Program provides financial rewards for partners that build and sell
services that utilize the network to address a customer's business need and
offers joint marketing and branding opportunities for managed service
providers that deliver premium services. The program currently includes
AT&T, CDW Berbee, Bell Canada, BT, Calence, Dimension Data, Getronics,
NetStar, Sprint, TELUS, Verizon Business and VSNL.
"Headquartered in South Africa, Dimension Data knows firsthand that there
is a huge opportunity in bringing innovative managed services to emerging
markets," said Scott Petty, group executive, services at Dimension Data, a
global IT services and solution provider that operates in over 40 countries
on six continents. "As network-based technology becomes more complex and
mission critical, our customers are increasingly interesting in buying
technology as a service. Especially in the small and medium-sized business
market, businesses want to be able to focus on their core competencies,
while still getting the benefits of an advanced communications solution."
"VSNL has decided to build a dedicated managed services operation from the
ground up to deliver enhanced customer experience and operational
excellence," said Vinod Kumar, president, Global Data Solutions at VSNL, a
leading global communications company and member of the Tata Group. "We
have seen explosive growth in managed services for small to medium-sized
businesses, as well as large enterprises around the world. The Cisco
Managed Services Channel Program helps us to support our service and
delivery operations in India and provide managed services globally."
Driving Premium Managed Services
The Cisco Managed Services Channel Program rewards partners for the
relative value of services delivered to customers. The program includes
three managed service program levels, Cisco Powered Managed Service,
Strategic Managed Service, and Legacy Managed Service. The premium Cisco
Powered Managed Service level currently includes designations for
Connectivity, Unified Communications, Security, Mobility and Data Center
Services.
To participate in the program partners must demonstrate the required
resources, systems, and procedures to deploy, manage, and support managed
network and IT solutions in all locations for which the services are
available. The program's entry criterion is based on the Information
Technology Infrastructure Library® (ITIL) framework of best practices. An
annual assessment of the partner's network operation center (NOC) is
conducted to review whether the requirements are met. In addition, the
managed services sold to customers must include a service-level agreement
with a minimum term of one year. Cisco Powered Managed Services are based
on industry standards and Cisco validated designs to help deliver a premium
end-user experience. Specific program requirements can be found at
http://www.cisco.com/go/mscp.
Offer-Based Channel Strategy Evolution
The Cisco Managed Services Channel Program marks an evolution of the Cisco
Channel Partner Program and a major step towards the development of the IT
industry's first offer-based channel strategy. To drive partner growth,
profitability and differentiation, Cisco is creating channel programs that
align to the three distinct offer types in the market today -- resale,
outsourcing and managed services.
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