What's The Score?

By Andrew R. Hickey

Cisco Systems Inc. and VoIP go together like chocolate and peanut butter, or at least solution providers who took the 2008 VARBusiness Annual Report Card survey say so. Cisco continued its dominance in the VoIP category by again snagging the coveted top spot, a position Cisco has held since it was first included four years ago.

Cisco swept the field, earning an overall score of 76, a massive seven points higher than the closest competition, Fountain Valley, Calif.-based D-Link Corp., which placed second with a score of 69. Rounding out the field were Alcatel-Lucent, Paris, 65; and Linksys, a Cisco-owned company, with 61. Cisco's score also put it a stellar eight points above the overall average score of 68.

When it comes to product innovation, support and partnership, Cisco was the runaway favorite, earning first-place nods under each subcategory and criteria, except for product compatibility and ease of integration, where it was ranked No. 2 behind D-Link.

Garth Brown, president and COO of Semaphore Corp., a Seattle-based solution provider, said Cisco's VoIP sweep is a testament to its ability to evolve its product offerings and programs.

"Cisco has continually evolved, iterated and invested in infrastructure and support and is always pushing the envelope on innovation," he said. "Over the years, it's gotten to be a better environment to work in with them."

Cisco, Brown said, puts in time and effort into understanding profitability models. And Cisco's ability to invest in new technologies and re-evaluate its strategies as it grows has helped move it to the forefront of VoIP in solution providers' eyes, he said. Programs around VoIP, which weren't always the strongest, have been fortified and strengthened, earning partner confidence, Brown said.

"They reached a point where they understood they had to adapt to a partner model to be successful," he said.

Brown also said Cisco's stratification of its program, and its ability to let partners compete to find and acquire new business, has made him appreciate the partnership.

"If we invest in programs, tools and incentives, we can find new business and be competitive," he said. "We're a smaller organization focusing specifically on high-touch, advanced technologies."

Cisco's massive breadth, spanning voice, video and data, also makes it easier for solution providers, such as Semaphore, to offer a more rounded solution. In addition, being able to offer an entire networking infrastructure as opposed to parts and pieces, gives customers one "throat to choke."

"They have such a comprehensive product set, we can go to the table with everything and anything," Brown said.

Richard McLeod, Cisco's senior director for collaboration solutions, worldwide channels, said the high praise from solution providers stems not just from product superiority, but also from targeting partner needs.

"It's continuing what we've always done," he said, adding that Cisco has "a real keen focus of listening to partners and understanding their requirements."

McLeod said Cisco has remained steadfast about boosting partner profitability, strengthening its specializations and partner enablement.

"We're very strong believers of if you use the solution, you can know it and you can sell it," he said. "And we try to design into all of our solutions the ability to offer professional services."

McLeod said Cisco solutions are well-respected, especially in the VoIP arena. And as the VoIP market evolves into unified communications, Cisco is working diligently to get partners on board by offering rewards, training programs and other incentives as they work their way up the stack to offer unified communications applications.

D-Link, which nabbed the No. 2 spot, credited its success on its VoIP partnership with Microsoft Corp. and its ability to offer VoIP-centric products solely through the channel, in contrast to most of its competition.

Next: Volume Mainstream Business Servers