Legacy data centres may have been a blue chip company dominated space but today smaller organisations too are eyeing the space, thanks to evolving business models. Reseller ME puts the spotlight on the regional data centre market and the opportunities it presents for the channel community.
For any organisation today, be it enterprise or a SMB, the data centre is undoubtedly the most critical element of its infrastructure. More than its basic function of storing, managing and analysing a company’s large amounts of data, it is also a critical component of a firm’s ICT framework.
While several large organisations have their own data centres, increasing costs and complicated business operations are compelling some firms to outsource its data centre management and maintenance requirements.
According to a report, ‘Global SMB Spending on Data Centers Market 2014-2018’ released by Infiniti Research, small to mid-size businesses will allocate larger percentages of its technology budgets for data centre services. This will result in a considerable expansion in the sector, leading to a compound annual growth rate of 18.39 percent from 2013 through 2018.
Additionally, an IDC report states that the market for managed and data centre services is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 19.8 percent between 2013 and 2018 to reach a total of $971.8 million by 2018.
With evolving business priorities, organisations are increasingly looking at reducing its CAPEX and are opting for consumption-based pricing models.
Savitha Bhaskar, COO, Condo Protego, says, “Middle East organisations are changing their mindset on data centres from a cost centre to driving new business models in the digital economy. Organisations – from SMEs to large enterprises – are increasingly placing how they manage, store, and analyse their data at the heart of their operations.”
Channel partners have a big opportunity in the space provided they play their cards right.
Anoop Sharda, Chief Technology Officer, Buzinessware, says, “Resellers can definitely take advantage of the data centre services ranging all the way from virtual servers, cloud servers, dedicated servers, co-locations spaces and all services in the IAAS space, be it load balancers, database-as-a-service, storage or back-up-as-service, disaster-as-a-service so on and so forth.”
He adds that resellers can begin tapping into the opportunities present by starting to package data centre services along with their existing products and services as add-ons or value-added services for their customers.
“They can give storage services, disaster recovery services, cloud connections, virtual private cloud, hybrid cloud services and the like.”
Bhaskar believes channel partners and systems integrators in the Middle East should help customers identify their data centre needs, deliver the solutions that meet those needs, and then upskill customer staff to use the latest solutions.
“Vendors and distributors are essential in helping partners acquire the skills and knowledge on the latest solutions, especially in software-defined data centres and all-flash storage,” she adds.
But that is also the challenge most channel partners face – lack of skillset or adequate knowledge – and this is the case with most emerging technologies as well.
Partners need to understand how the emergence of cloud is impacting data centre solutions and what that means for end customers. They need to be in a position to guide customers through the intricacies of such scenarios.
Sharda adds, “Resellers definitely need to be educated in this space. They need to be fully aware of the potential products and recurring revenue capabilities in the segment.
“What we have seen till date, is a simple reseller hosting package, which partners have bought, however, this is not even the beginning of the opportunities out there,” he adds.
While the onus is on the vendors and distributors to empower the channel in this area, it is also simultaneously the responsibility of the partners to stay plugged into the latest developments in the market.
“We at Buzinessware are planning to launch a business-in-a-box end-to-end channel partner programme for infrastructure services for the Middle East. What that will entail is a control panel where the reseller will be able to market their products and their own prices to their customers with their own branding, which will be a significant push from infrastructure services market into the reseller channel,” adds Sharda.
The decisions partners take today will set the course of their businesses for the next few years. Therefore, it is imperative that they view the larger picture before taking any action.
Sharda says, “From the Middle East and the data centre services perspective, it’s really just the beginning of what’s going to take shape and form. And I believe going forward, there will be many partnerships in the reseller channel provisioning all that can happen through partner programmes, which can help the system develop cloud benefits to one and all.”
According to Bhaskar, in the coming years, the largest Middle East opportunity will be in hyper-converged infrastructure.
She says, “By combining data storage and processing in one factory-assembled box, hyper-converged infrastructure is the foundation of software-defined data centres, and can lower TCO by 30 percent.”
Channel partners have a mammoth task ahead of them, first identifying their strengths and then in the areas within data centre solutions and services where they can build their businesses. Those who dive into the opportunity and maximise it, will be the ones who have a higher chance of survival in the digital era.
