SMB Market: Round Table

How to retain profitability within the channel is an issue vendors, distributors and resellers have to constantly stay focused on

Virtualisation is dominant in the enterprise market today, but how is it faring in the SMB space? ARN brought together a collection of channel players and vendors to discuss the opportunities and challenges for virtualisation technology in the smaller end of town.

ARN recently held a roundtable on selling virtualisation to SMBs. Attached are highlights from the recent event.

One highly-debated topic raised during the roundtable was whether resellers were investing in building managed and cloud services to meet increased customer demand.

While the case for server virtualisation in the SMB market is intensifying, many partners around the table were less convinced about short-term take-up of desktop virtualisation.

One of the questions raised by Dell’s Jon McBride was how resellers were taking virtualisation in their customer base to the next level. While many clients claim to have deployed virtualisation extensively, a bit of digging shows many only have about 10 per cent of their environment on virtual technology.

Growing popularity of hosting, cloud and the managed services model are raising questions around whether telcos will again threaten the traditional systems integration channel in the SMB space.

Vendors, the channel and the media have spent plenty of time dwelling on the acceptance and deployment of virtualisation in the enterprise sector, but just how far has this technology come at the smaller end of town?

ARN pulled together a panel of industry representatives to discuss how to position security solutions successfully to 5-499 seat organisations in today’s economic climate. This roundtable was held in conjunction with Symantec.

Managing IT systems and staff is a massive trial for any business, but when you’re experiencing growth through expansion and acquisition it’s even more challenging. Taking a managed services approach allowed one organisation get a grip on its infrastructure, as MATTHEW SAINSBURY found out.