Arrow Electronics sprang several new support programs on its Sun Microsystems partners this week, including MOCA Vantage to help partners develop business opportunities in the SMB market.
Arrow Electronics Inc.’s MOCA division, a dedicated Sun Microsystems Inc. distributorship, announced MOCA Vantage, technical support and business development tools for partners focused on the SMB (small to midsize business) market; MASS (MOCA accelerated Storage Solutions), business development, marketing and technical support specifically for Sun storage applications; and upgrades to the Sun Service Center’s VORTEX, a web based tool for VARs to manage Sun Microsystems leads and service opportunities.
Arrow also announced programs for other vendor channels at its annual Net@Work partner Forum in Santa Ana Pueblo, N.M. and unveiled Government Central, a sales and business development support program for VARs focused on federal, state and educational opportunities.
MOCA Vantage is a set of enhanced go-to-market programs including sales, marketing and demonstration support, designed to boost channel sales for Sun’s suite of AMD Opteron processor-based solutions including Sun Galaxy servers, the company said.
The program is aimed specifically at the midsize market, where both vendor and distributor see room for growth, said Kevin Powell, Arrow’s vice president of business development.
The MASS initiative, to push Sun’s storage solutions, includes Proof of Concept modeling to evaluate solutions, marketing initiatives for the popular Information Lifecycle Management solutions plus sales and technical support.
Sun Service Center will add new functionalities to VORTEX, including a contract opportunity finder to match VARs with service opportunities, access to SUN service Contracts in PDF format, and a change and cancellation tool to track service orders.
Arrow also announced Arrow Government Central to provide more dedicated personnel and government-specific resources to channel partners in Arrow’s four selling divisions.
“Arrow Government Central was developed to centralize our valued resources and streamline our government-focused efforts to create more efficiencies for our partners,” said Michael Clancy, Arrow’s vice president of strategic business development.
The program will be headed by Skip Liesegang, Sun’s former channel chief.
Arrow Government Central offers partners sales assistance, market overviews, budget forecasts and spending analyses to help qualify leads and leverage competitive advantages, according to a company release.
Partners can also benefit from Arrow’s strategic relationships with professional services firms with high-level security clearances, GSA (General Services Administration) consulting services and government training companies.
A companion Web site is set be launched early next year, the company said.
Arrow announced two additional sessions of McAfee Inc. Entercept Prevention Solutions training Oct. 11 and 12 in Vienna, Va., in response to heavy turnout at Arrow’s June sessions.
The program, for systems engineers and sales representatives, is designed to highlight the advantage of Intrusion Prevention vs. Intrusion Detection.