Keep on Runnin’: How the IT Channel Can Power an Expanding IT Infrastructure

This was the main subject at a lively and wide-ranging panel discussion at the Vertiv Annual Channel Summit and Awards. The digital event, held on 17 November, also included awards for the channel, a virtual expo showing Vertiv’s latest technologies, and its resources and support for channel partners.

The panel (Josh Budd, editor of CRN, Karsten Winther, Vice President, Sales EMEA, at Vertiv, Julian Thompson, Senior Director, Advanced Solutions at Ingram Micro UK, a reseller of IT equipment and IT services, and Jithin Asokan, Projects Manager at Smartworld) began by discussing how the industry had changed during the last 18 months.

Julian said that the immediate “clamour to work from home” during the pandemic lockdowns meant that demand for IT devices and unified communication “went through the roof.”

He added that many of its trading partners took furlough – government financial support for those unable to work because of the pandemic. The pandemic has highlighted the importance of deep working relationships in the industry, which can help businesses in the channel deal with difficult trading conditions, he said.

“[The high number of businesses that took furlough] suggested to me that there [were] a lot of transactional relationships [in the channel], which by definition are short term,” Julian said. “And as you start to trade through a challenging [environment], if you have a depth of relationship, you will be much better placed to come through the other side.”

Karsten agreed. “We and others in the channel industry are returning to the partners you trust and have a long-term relationship with rather than a transactional relationship. We have all had an opportunity to sharpen our swords as to what a trustful [business] relationship is like in the channel.”

Another challenge during the pandemic was getting the IT infrastructure of Vertiv and its customers up and running, while complying with pandemic-related health precautions, he said.

Remote monitoring of data centre sites and cloud computing helped keep customers’ infrastructure running and increase in capacity at short notice. “Customers wanted to be able to switch to cloud at a moment’s notice,” he said.

He added: “We invented tons of augmented and virtual reality tools to test customers’ IT infrastructure remotely. A number of our customers have insisted that this remote testing continues. It’s a good thing as it minimises the CO² footprint in terms of travel.”

Demand for cloud computing, which has accelerated during the pandemic, is also fuelling growth in the channel market.

Customers are getting more comfortable migrating data from on their premises to a cloud-based service and paying per use of IT resources, panellist, Jithin said. “Customers want to host their data in the cloud rather than locally. Much more is done remotely, including training.”

Sustainability in the IT infrastructure industry – for example, customers demanding energy efficiency and wanting to reuse IT infrastructure – is another major trend in the channel market, panellists said.

An increasing number of tech companies have set targets for “net zero” (not adding to the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere).

“[Vertiv] is making sure we don’t use too much water in the cooling technologies, making sure that we use renewable energy in the power solutions and that we don’t use too much power in those solutions,” said Karsten.

Vertiv is also focusing on minimising waste in its manufacturing and supply chain, he said.

“We can go as far to say that [sustainability] is being demanded more by our customers,” Karsten said. “It is a pre-condition. It’s the way it works now, and it will only increase.”

Many projects for critical IT infrastructure have been delayed because of the pandemic. However, panellists said that customers were keen to make up for lost time, and are placing orders for large projects even if earlier projects have not finished.

“We have seen a huge increase in enterprise [IT infrastructure] projects,” said Julian. “Build back better? Maybe. But build back right for what’s required? Definitely.”

After a tumultuous 18 months, the future for the IT infrastructure channel market looks bright.

Amid a seemingly insatiable demand from consumers and business for data, the digital market infrastructure looks set to maintain its strong growth.

Suppliers to the market, and their channel partners, will need to work closely to meet growing demand.

“We can’t build a factory close to every site,” said Karsten. “We are seeing new technologies and we are seeing new demands coming from customers, and not just for sustainability, but also for monitoring services.

This industry is growing like there is no tomorrow. The bandwidth of the Internet is growing more than ever before and the need to go from the core to the Edge [technology] is growing like never before.”

A good channel partnership between suppliers and resellers requires co-operation and understanding of what each party can contribute, panellists said.

In the coming months and year, Vertiv will release additional resources for its channel partners. They will include a marketing centre within the Partner Portal, including co-branded web content, emails and other marketing resources, and a “virtual showroom”, enabling Vertiv partners to have meetings with customers and demonstrate Vertiv power, cooling, monitoring and data centre infrastructure technologies and services.

 “A good channel partnership is probably aligning and understanding where those partnership capabilities come in handy,” Karsten said. “We need a lot of different actors to keep the customer at the centre of everything we do.

Watch the full discussion on demand.

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