A new channel to market
Cobweb have established a way to effectively become a distributor and reseller within the cloud ecosystem, delivering services itself while enabling others to do so in specific niche markets. It enables companies to offer Microsoft (and other) services from an accredited reseller that they would not normally be able to. It also opens up possibilities for small firms to retain relationships as they can now offer a complete relationship to their customers even after they transfer to a cloud solution.
Ash Patel, Director of Business Transformation at Cobweb commenting in the press release said:
“Cobweb’s cobweb platform of packaged services offers a rocket pack for resellers looking to soar in the cloud. We’re answering the question, ‘when is a cloud distributor not a cloud distributor? When it’s a Cobweb’. Cobweb’s integration capability provides partners with sector specific solutions, allowing companies, big and small, to seize new opportunities with cloud power. Additionally we’re able to give partners a Go to Market as a service that other businesses would struggle to achieve on their own.”
Conclusion
This is an interesting move from Cobweb although not without risks. Interestingly it has not listed any sample companies who have taken advantage of the service yet and it will be interesting to see how popular and what kind of company takes advantage of the offering. There is no reference to the fees that Cobweb will be charging for the solution and this in itself may make it more expensive for some customers to utilize this service.
Cobweb will be accrediting its channel. Unfortunately the response to the question around how this will work was a little vague in places as one might have expected at least some sort of accreditation levels. This is something that Cobweb needs to address quickly.
However for SME business who wish to maintain an existing relationship with a local supplier, but who see the advantages of moving to the cloud as well, this might be the answer to delivering both. For those small IT service companies out there it will be worth a look at what Cobweb are offering in detail to see whether it can help deliver a complete service to their customers.
What Cobweb will need to do is see whether they can expand the ecosystem to include SaaS applications at the right price to offer through the Cobweb platform. Solutions that may include: Xero or Sage Online for accounting, Adobe and Salesforce.
Cobweb Solutions will be present at Microsoft’s largest UK Partner event, Future Decoded, being held on 10th & 11th November at Excel and will be able to talk further about this announcement.
