ARC Scores: Look Both Ways

Thirteen vendors reign victorious in this year's Annual Report Card. That means their scores, averaged across 11 criteria, are higher than any other company in their respective categories. Simple enough. But, really, that only tells part of the story.

Instead of reading across the rows to see how an individual company scored overall across all criteria, scan down the columns to see which companies ruled by criterion. A different picture unfolds. Apple, for example, which placed second in both the clients and entry-level server categories, clearly bested out all other vendors in the loyalty rating, with an impressive 9.1 score. (Loyalty is not one of the criteria factored into the overall total, but is an important facet of the solution provider-vendor relationship that we benchmark each year.)

Sweeping first place in a staggering seven criteria is Cisco, with the highest scores for product quality/functionality, presales support, postsales support, marketing support, administration of solution provider program, communication and e-business program. The vendor also won the networking infrastructure category.

Computer Associates, meanwhile, which won for its systems management software, was singled out by solution providers for its channel strategy.

New to the ARC are Allaire and Vignette, and already they're making names for themselves. Allaire--which placed first for enterprise development tools and tied for first with IBM for Internet software--also grabbed top numbers for product availability and tied with Vignette for ease of doing business. In addition, Vignette, along with KDS, led the vendor pack for revenue/profit potential.

Storage systems and display technology were judged on two criteria separate from the rest of the categories: technical innovation, for which ViewSonic,which placed first in its category,won; and technical support, for which Western Digital,also the category winner,was tops.