The worlds of business and IT are going through some massive changes as digitalisation and cognitive computing become mainstream – and channel partners have to keep up to date. Mark Davison attended IBM’s PartnerWorld conference in Las Vegas where partners got some insights into the future.

IBM salutes innovative partners

One of the highlights of PartnerWorld at The Cosmopolitan Hotel in Las Vegas last month was the awarding of IBM’s annual Beacon and Choice awards, recognising innovation within its partner community – and there were some familiar names among the winners.
“Each year, these awards have gone to a select group of partners that have come up with some very unique solutions,” says Marc Dupaquier, GM, IBM Global Business Partners.

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IBM prepares partners for Cognitive Era

Keeping pace with continually evolving business models, IBM has once again revamped its PartnerWorld programme to help its partners better deal with what it calls the Cognitive Era.
And Marc Dupaquier, GM, IBM Global Business Partners, says the company will continue to tweak its partner programme as and when required.

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Reseller survival in the Digital Age

Digital transformation has put the frighteners on many in the channel, but one veteran US reseller has successfully transitioned – and he has some sage advice to others looking to follow the same path.
Andy Lin, VP of Strategy for Mark III, explains that as a decades-old IBM Business Partner, the company has faced as many challenges through the years as Big Blue itself.

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IBM takes partners into the digital world

Like it or loathe it, digital transformation is the way the world and its traditional businesses and industries are moving – and they’re moving fast. As one seasoned business partner quipped here in Las Vegas: “There’s probably been more change at IBM in the past two years than over the previous two decades.”

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IBM partners get access to VMware

In what’s been described as a “one of a kind” agreement, IBM has announced that its channel partners will now be able to sell VMware subscription-based solutions running on the IBM Cloud.
IBM Business Partners can now provide a one-stop shop for clients looking to migrate their on-premises VMware platforms to the cloud by providing a portfolio of lifecycle services including planning, architecture, migration and end-to-end management.

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IBM strengthens OS offering

Following hot on the heels of IBM’s tie-up with VMware came the announcement that the company has also signed an agreement with Hortonworks, making Hortonworks Data Platform (HDP) available for IBM Elastic Storage Server (ESS) and its Spectrum Scale.
The agreement will lead to the certification of HDP on Power and x86 systems.

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