IBM Global Services Explains Midmarket Sell

The new Manage it for Me portfolio of managed services is targeted at companies with 1,000 or fewer employees. Among the services clients can select are intrusion detection, network management and 18 others.

David Parker, director of marketing for IGS' integrated technology services and strategic outsourcing, described most of the services as "business-partner enabled. The business partner will likely be the channel."

Nevertheless, IBM solution providers, who have learned to view IGS as both a complement to their own skills and a competitor to win clients, wondered about IGS' latest move into the midmarket space.

"We are obviously concerned, and curious about the offering," said an IBM systems integration partner, who requested anonymity.

The anxiety among integrators stems from historical confusion about whether IGS is working with, or in competition with, channel partners.

IBM CEO Sam Palmisano and other top management have acknowledged past conflict between IBM's channel and IGS, its $37 billion professional services arm. Earlier this year, Palmisano's lieutenant, Ralph Martino, vice president of strategy and marketing at IGS, said IBM would let partners take the lead in consulting and systems integration services for business customers with annual revenue of $100 million or less.

On Tuesday, Parker drew a distinction between the consulting services that fall under IGS' Business Innovation Services unit and the range of managed services that comprise the Manage it for Me offering.

"When it comes to managed services like Web hosting, a lot of them fall in the areas that are still being sold [by IGS to a range of customers," he said.

Parker said some of the Manage it for Me services, such as a CRM-maintenance product, were originally created with the needs of enterprise clients in mind. But as more midsize customers expressed interest in handing off the maintenance of their CRM applications to an outside party, IGS decided to create a way for partners to resell the service, he said.

The resale mechanism for the Manage it for Me services and others offered by IGS is under development now, Parker said.