Over the last half-decade, we have witnessed a fundamental shift in how local enterprises procure and invest in technology.
By Burak Borhan, regional director: partner ecosystems Middle East and Africa at Red Hat
The rise of cloud computing – South Africa’s cloud market is expected to grow annually by 26% between 2023 and 2028 – along with the adoption of services such as software-as-a-service (SaaS), platform-as-a-service (PaaS) and infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS), means organisations are not just going cloud-native, but also participating in a globally connected IT ecosystem.
As enterprises seek more holistic solutions to fulfil their IT needs, they are also looking to forge relationships with their platform and software vendors. IT is no longer a product that’s purchased over a counter. This, combined with new business models and collaboration methods, can result in increased complexity and risk for organisations.
What’s needed is a new approach to co-creation – a new way for enterprises to diversify and transform themselves to become leaders in this new ecosystem.
A new kind of partner experience
South Africa’s IT services sector boasts remarkable resilience thanks to the growth of cloud and other drivers such as digital transformation, automation, and cybersecurity. In addition, many businesses are prioritising value co-creation with an emphasis on sustainable business priorities, all while avoiding disruptions caused by intense cloud migration and integration processes.
In light of these evolving market dynamics, Red Hat strategically established a globally standardised partner engagement experience, directly addressing the evolving needs of the market. The aim for many industry-leading vendors now is to transform how we build and connect customer solutions while streamlining the collaboration process for its partners to better address their customers’ needs.
In January 2024, Red Hat first announced it would transform its global partner experience by offering increased simplicity, choice, and flexibility. The Red Hat Partner Practice Accelerator Program would focus on identifying, enabling, and incentivising partners while empowering them to lead the full customer lifecycle and achieve impactful outcomes using Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform and Red Hat OpenShift. In April, local technology vendor LSD Open was accepted into the program, a first for Sub-Saharan Africa, empowering LSD Open to take its innovative enterprise solutions to the next level.
Fast-forward to the present, and Red Hat is taking the first step in updating its partner program, opening the door to new opportunities and a cutting-edge framework for enterprises across the region to grow their business and generate new revenue.
Partner modules and other features
With the updates to its partner program, Red Hat has implemented a new framework based on ‘modules’ that allow partners to self-select activities and, subsequently, more easily dedicate resources to key business areas depending on their goals or demands.
The ‘Resell’, ‘Distribution’, and ‘Sell With’ modules are the first batch now available, with more modules to be introduced at a later stage to further distinguish market routes and other areas of collaboration. The new modular setup to the partner program will provide greater flexibility in go-to-market strategies, allowing partners to align much closer to their customers’ demands and consumption strategy.
Aligning with the goal of value co-creation, the updated partner framework as part of each module. This helps emphasise the value that each partner brings to customers, not just from a revenue-based perspective.
Moreover, new features in the framework include a standardised registration process, making it easier for partners to register new initiatives and receive support, as well as improvements to Red Hat’s market development fund (MDF) tools and processes.
With complexity comes the need to simplify as much as possible.
To help partners with the new modules, Red Hat has equipped its Partner Connect portal with a new interface that streamlines user interactions and guides partners through module activities. Partners can also access metric dashboards that provide detailed, real-time performance and reporting on opportunity management, effectively giving them a bird’s-eye view of their progress.
Taking two and more steps forward
Not every enterprise enjoys longstanding relationships with its platform and software vendors. In fact, many across southern Africa are only now just starting on their IT modernisation journeys. But what all have in common is the potential to forge partnerships that not just drive growth but contribute to a growing ecosystem characterised by flexibility, collaboration, and agility.
Collaboration, in particular, is becoming imperative as technology trends such as AI and virtualization grow to define the modern organisation. Collaboration led to the creation of the world’s leading open-source and integrated IT solutions, the ones that power entire businesses and accelerate innovation across all spheres.
This, combined with a commitment to listen to the needs of its partners and use gathered feedback to inform and improve the partner experience, is what makes the Red Hat partner ecosystem so powerful.