Channel Chat

The announcement that IBM expanded its PartnerWorld offering was big news at last week’s Think Digital online conference. Chris MacLaughlin, IBM Global Partner Ecosystem CMO, talked to PartnerOn Journal’s Jeff Mesnik about the significance of the expansion, and how it aligns with IBM’s strategy to meet clients where they are in their cloud journey.

Watch this video to catch highlights of Chris’s conversation with Jeff — including the specifics of the new PartnerWorld offerings to help partners create solutions and services on and around the IBM Cloud. Learn about the steps IBM is taking to respond to partner feedback for less friction and more digital tools across the buying cycle. 

We’re planning to catch up again with Chris another time to talk about the future of online events in the post-COVID world. In the meantime, please get in touch if there are any topics you’d like to see covered in PartnerOn Journal.

In our last edition of PartnerOn Journal, we were only just starting to consider how the unexpected shift to remote work would evolve into new normals that when embraced, would lead to new opportunities and even wins.

Two weeks later, we’re seeing new paradigms and viewpoints rise from a shared commitment to help people and business not only survive, but also thrive in the face of the COVID-19 crisis. The mission of Cisco to frame business around solutions that ‘help’ and ‘connect’ employees, communities and individuals is an excellent example. 

In a recent conversation, John Moses, Cisco VP of Americas Partner Organization, shared some of the specific ways Cisco is helping customers connect people to the support and resources they need to get and stay well. These include free Webex licenses to healthcare providers transitioning to telemedicine, as well as responding to the exploding demand for security solutions to protect remote workers.

Watch this video for highlights of our talk.

I’m not alone in thinking that many of the remote-work trends emerging from our Coronavirus coping efforts will stick. So why not embrace them? You might find some inspiration from my talk with John — particularly the part where he describes how Webex use is going through the roof. I’ll raise a glass to that!

On Monday, next-gen digital services and consulting leader Infosys, announced it joined IBM in a global alliance to help enterprises accelerate digital transformation in the IBM public cloud. 

This is big news for companies in highly-regulated industries like financial services, looking to modernize enterprise workloads and applications by harnessing the unique, enterprise-grade security capabilities of the IBM public cloud. 

All eyes will be on Infosys, the first global system integrator to join the new IBM Public Cloud Ecosystem, created to bring public cloud services to enterprise customers. Bob Lord, IBM SVP of Cognitive Applications, told ParterOn Journal editor Jeff Mesnik he’s confident the partner ecosystem will embrace the program once the Infosys-IBM alliance has a few client wins under its belt.

Jeff talked with Bob and Infosys President Ravi Kumar shortly after the alliance was announced. Both are excited about the opportunities ahead. Jeff is excited to toast the win over the pair’s favorite celebratory drinks — a double malt Scotch and a Titos on the rocks with a lemon twist! Catch highlights of the conversation in this video. 

Oh, and one more thing: Through a partnership with Arrow, IBM streams campaign content directly to partners that use its free channel marketing service, PartnerOn. This is the place to come for helpful content (i.e. customer success stories, analyst research, eBooks and demo videos) customizable marketing messages and digital tools that make it easy to engage regularly with your target audience online. Join here.