All channel partners will need to adopt a different kind of business model over the next two years says Steve Cant, Vice President, Europe, and Global Lead HPE at TD SYNNEX Advanced Solutions
The HPE team at TD SYNNEX have been running internal workshops over the last few weeks around the theme of What will the world look like in 2023? The discussions and conclusions we’ve reached have been really interesting.
We’ve been doing this as part of a wider plan aimed at crystalising our own vision and formulating a coherent strategy that will support HPE partners in being successful with HPE GreenLake. Although 2023 is only two years away, there are going to be some big changes during that time, and we will need to be ready.
Towards EaaS
We’ve been doing this in the context of HPE moving rapidly towards Everything as a Service (EaaS), and that’s something it has said it wants to do on an even faster timescale – by 2022. But, of course, when HPE made that proclamation, the pandemic had not happened. One of the first things we had to recognise is that this unprecedented global event has delayed everyone’s plans over the last year.
It also means that, when we do emerge from this period into one in which there are no obvious restrictions and restraints on organisations and individuals, there is likely to be a huge acceleration of transformational activity. Businesses are already adapting to hybrid ways of working and they will be looking to adopt more flexible, scalable, and adaptable infrastructures.
Early movers
We’re already starting to see the early stages of this already. The level of interest in HPE GreenLake is growing daily. HPE partners are receiving enquiries not only from large enterprises, but also from mid-sized organisations, so there will be opportunities right across the market. Over the next two years, we expect a huge number of end-user customers to start moving workloads into HPE GreenLake.
This means that, by 2023, we and our HPE partners will need to be capable of supporting customers’ hybrid infrastructures and operating an entirely different business model to the one that we have today. This will be much more focused on service and on subscription revenues. We will need the skills and capabilities to monitor and manage hybrid environments, and automated processes that enable us to track and bill consumption accurately.
Big steps
Both we and our partners need to take some big steps between now and 2023 in order to provide that kind of service. Our What will the world look like in 2023? discussions have really helped us to understand what we need to do in order to transform our own business and support the transformation of our partners. It’s an exercise that many partners could usefully conduct themselves – if you want to do that and need some advice on how to structure the discussion, we’ll be happy to help.
One thing that always needs to be kept in mind is that it’s the customer experience that really matters. If we keep that to the front and centre of our thinking, we should be moving in the right direction.