This past year has been one of transformation as we evolve our channel strategy and journey. I am extremely proud of the successful new BuildingBLOX partner program we launched in August, focused on growth, value and profitability. And I am humbled to be recognized as a CRN Channel Chief for 2018. CRN describes a Channel Chief as someone who has demonstrated loyalty and ongoing support for the IT channel by consistently promoting, defending and executing outstanding channel partner programs. This is a testament to my team, and to the strength and commitment of Infoblox’s overall channel strategy.
The technology landscape is changing, and gone are the days when just pitching a customer the latest product is a successful sales and business technique. Organizations’ needs are more complex than ever, and driving business outcomes for our customers is tantamount to success. Our partners help us drive a true solutions approach to our customers.
Building successful partnerships requires commitments from all aspects of our business. Partners want to align with vendors who are committed to building collaborative, profitable, long-term relationships. And as such, relationships are things my team at Infoblox are deeply committed to cultivating and nurturing. As we evolve our business to further meet customers’ needs around cloud, managed services, and other technologies and business models, we look forward to taking our partners on the journey.
A strong channel strategy is also imperative in the cybersecurity industry. As the risk of cyber threats increase and hackers become more sophisticated in their attack methods, minimizing the threat of attack is no longer solved with a point product. It takes solutions often made up of multiple components that work together seamlessly to protect infrastructure and data in an organization. At Infoblox, we understand the importance of this and I have personally taken the responsibility to build out a network that complements our solutions.
In addition, as cybercriminals grow more and more sophisticated, partnerships and relationships are key not just for business success, but technical and security effectiveness. In a recent Ponemon report commissioned by Infoblox, “Exchanging Cyber Threat Intelligence: There Has to Be a Better Way,” 67% of respondents reported their organizations spend more than 50 hours per week on threat investigations. This is not an efficient use of time, and could be prevented if organizations worked together to share threat intel and pool resources… allowing them to get to the root of the threats faster. Threat intelligence is one element of cybersecurity where “better together” applies and underscores why strong partnerships and collaboration are critical.
This award is a great honor for me personally. When we focus on building strong partnerships and engaging with our channel partners, we create better solutions that meet our customer’s needs.