Today Linux is no more an option, it is a necessity

Dataquest: Has Linux truly made inroads into the enterprise segment or is it just a hype?

Tirthankar Mitra: We have seen more adoption of Linux in the mainstream applications, by which I mean that there are various initiatives that customers have taken across verticals starting from banking, financial services, telecom, and government. Open source has made tremendous inroads into the enterprise space because of its very nature of business model.

Dataquest: What part does the channel play in this success?

TM: From an Indian perspective, we have very strong channel. We have routes across enterprise, mid-tier as well as the low end part of the market. We have not entered into the consumer business space.

We have close to around seventy-five channel partners which are the foundation of tier-2 solution providers. They are primarily working in the commercial space, which is the mid-market space. This also contributes 80% of our business, while 20% comes from larger enterprises.

Dataquest: But with the emergence of the value added distributors who sell technology rather than products, do you plan to align with them as well?

TM: Yes, you are right. Each of these value added distributors who have come up in the recent times have identified a technology track to focus on. We are looking at a couple of them because our kind of technology circumvents around giving software as a solution and service.

Dataquest: Brief us about your channel plans?

TM: Fundamentally there are three things we are doing. Firstly, we have started a survey across APAC in terms of looking at partner skills through our online partner center. We encourage each partner to go through this survey as it gives us an overview on their need for a training requirement.

Secondly, we do lead management where we work closely with distributors and partners to generate leads and close them. So if I am a channel partner and I get more than two leads from my principal then it is more than what I can expect.

Dataquest: Is this is a new initiative?

TM: No, this is something we have been doing for some time. But what we are doing through the partner center is adding lead management portfolio to select partners in the enterprise and SMB market. The third initiative is where we get the partners on board, we then figure out the skills they need to have from the technical and sales perspective. Then we sign up the business plan with them where we get a dive into the resources they will invest, the numbers they will achieve and the support they will need from our end.