Cisco intros Cloud Partner Program

 NEW DELHI, INDIA: Cisco has announced the commencement of its comprehensive Cloud Partner Program (CPP) for SI partners, resellers and VARs to effectively monetize the opportunities in the multi-billion dollar cloud computing space.

The company said that it is the first infrastructure OEM to offer a cloud partner program, which rewards partners not only to build clouds on Cisco infrastructure but also to act as cloud providers and resell cloud services.

B Raghavendran, vice president, Partner Organization at Cisco India & SAARC, said that the program gives flexibility to partners to take up a role in the market.

“CPP is an inclusive partner-centric program and empowers partners to maximize opportunities in the market,” he said.

The new program provides partners flexibility and empowers them to maximize their profitability by offering their own brand of cloud services practice, powered by Cisco.

Raghavendran further said this program will enable partners to be adequately prepared to meet the large-scale demand for adoption of cloud services by customers in the coming years.

He said this is a first in the industry where the designation is built on the validation of both Cisco and non-Cisco competencies necessary to build a cloud.

“The partner will see an additional return on their Cisco and partner investments by leveraging them into a role they can play in the cloud market. We expect to see the first set of partners being certified on the program, before the end of 2011,” he informed.

The company is optimistic about the cloud market in India. Gartner in its recent study said that 50 per cent of all CIOs are expected to operate majority of their applications on cloud by 2015.