IT Distribution Warms to Hyperscaler Marketplace Cooperation

At the North American GTDC Summit, one theme consistently surfaced alongside AI and economic uncertainty: hyperscaler marketplaces are no longer a side conversation for IT distribution—they are central to the channel’s future.

Executives from Arrow, Ingram Micro, and TD SYNNEX told Channel Insider that AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft marketplaces are now embedded in how enterprise customers buy. As that remains true, their companies have worked to keep their partners attached to deals and to keep them sticky with customers.

Why hyperscaler marketplaces now shape enterprise buying

The “big three” hyperscalers, as they are often called, have each rolled out a marketplace buying experience over the past several years. 

Of the three, AWS is probably the most well-known, though Google and Microsoft have invested heavily in catching up with the market in recent years. 

All three offer end-user companies the opportunity to apply credits and commitment terms to their technology purchases, adding new layers to the decisions business leaders make about technical needs and budget constraints.

To traditional distribution, the advent of a new way to procure and deploy is a disruption they continue to contend with.

“They hyperscalers are a strange animal for the channel,” Arrow Global ECS President Eric Nowak told Channel Insider. “They’re a vendor and a supplier in some ways, so as a distributor, we sell the cloud and AI solutions, and that’s like any other vendor relationship we have.”

“But then there’s the other part, and that’s the marketplace. And really, they can be a great help to the channel, because they have agreements with the end users, and partners can take profit off this … but they can also be seen as an alternative in some ways, because they can sell directly,” Nowak continued. 

From channel disruption to strategic integration

On stage during a panel discussion with several distribution executives, GTDC CEO Frank Vitagliano recalled conversations just a few years ago in which many honestly wondered whether hyperscalers would become friends or foes of the traditional IT distribution model.

Fast forward to 2026, and all of them are actively integrating and working with the big three to procure and provision through both buying experiences. 

“Everyone knows there’s commits being made by those end users to those hyperscalers,” Ingram Micro CEO Paul Bay said during the panel. “That’s great. We want to make our solution providers are still able to service the entire piece of it and not lose visibility.”

Ingram Micro’s Xvantage platform integrates deeply with the AWS marketplace, for example, to keep partners attached to deals their customers want to funnel through the hyperscaler.

Arrow, TD SYNNEX, and others also work closely with AWS to blend their offerings with the marketplace. 

Nowak and TD SYNNEX CEO Patrick Zammit also spoke on the panel about the importance of working within the system of credits and commitments through hyperscaler marketplaces to ensure partners remain involved in, and profit from, the technology decisions made by their customers.

How vendor and partner demand has fueled the evolution of marketplace integrations

To Nowak, hyperscaler marketplaces also offer a new way for vendors to achieve their goals. 

As he told Channel Insider, Arrow works closely with its vendor partners to understand what each vendor expects from them in terms of market coverage, target accounts, and geographical expansion.

“Basically, you just need to listen. If you focus on what the vendors are expecting, the hyperscalers will help you do that,” Nowak said. “These guys are part of the route to market now, and you need to cope with that. Fighting against it is a mistake.”

For distribution leaders, the debate over whether hyperscalers are friends or competitors has largely ended. Enterprise customers are committing spend to AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft, and marketplace transactions are now embedded in procurement strategy.

The opportunity for distributors is clear: stay attached to those transactions, preserve partner visibility, and help vendors navigate marketplace economics.