Sun Revamps iForce Program

Sun's VAR partners will now be designated Strategic iForce partners or iForce partners, said Bill Cate, director of the U.S. iForce Program Office.

Strategic iForce partners are eligible for an automatic 2 percent rebate on every Sun product they sell. ISVs that design and deploy products on Sun platforms will fall under the Strategic iForce designation and can earn up to a 3 percent rebate, Cate said.

Strategic iForce partners must have at least 10 sales reps and 10 engineers certified at the Sun enterprise level. Five of the 10 engineers must have a Solaris core certification, Cate said. In addition, Strategic iForce partners must have a specialty certification, such as clustering, in at least two areas and be branded either Storage Elite or Sun ONE Elite partners. Sun also requires Strategic iForce partners to have at least $10 million in annual revenue or a growth rate of 30 percent for one year, Cate said.

IForce partners need two sales reps and two engineers certified at the Sun enterprise level, plus a minimum of $250,000 in annual revenue or a 25 percent growth rate, Cate said. These partners are not eligible for cash rebates but can receive Sun Fund money worth 2 percent of products sold, he said.

All iForce solution providers also are eligible for a "Sun-only" rebate, equivalent to 1 percent of total sales, being paid to Sun partners that refrain from selling HP-UX, IBM AIX, EMC or Dell Computer products, Cate said. In addition, Sun is launching a target account program under which all iForce partners can earn 10 percent rebates for selling into "significant corporations with large IT budgets" that Sun has been unable to penetrate.

Rob Mock, president and CEO of Detroit-based solution provider Dewpoint, said the target account program was not popular among solution providers on Sun's VAR council. But Mock said Sun's decision to offer rebates shows that the vendor is taking a "show me the money" approach to its stated commitment to partners.

Another partner that has exclusively sold and recommended Sun products for two years,and who has been thinking about adding other vendors,took issue with the Sun-only rebate.

"Honestly, a 2 percent rebate on sales isn't going to make a business [grow significantly," said the solution provider, who requested anonymity.