APC Powers Up Multitiered Channel Program

West Kingston, R.I.-based APC said it will break its primary channel program into Silver and Gold categories. Gold partners will be those solution providers capable of designing systems of up to 80 kilowatts of power; Silver partners will be those capable of designing systems of up to 20 kilowatts and finding opportunities of up to 80 kilowatts.

Peter Klanian, North American director of partners and midmarket at APC, said the company is looking to recruit between 30 and 40 Gold partners and between 450 and 500 Silver partners by the end of the year. The move to bolster its channel comes as executives at chip makers Intel and Advanced Micro Devices say that power management has become a priority this year.

Scott Duggan, senior sales director at Ficomp, a Colmar, Pa.-based solution provider and integrator, said his company was impressed with APC's network power management solutions and channel programs and is planning to become an APC infrastructure partner. APC's new channel program, he said, will enable solution providers that invest in high-end competencies to garner additional profit.

Duggan said the market is now reacting much more favorably to uninterrupted power supply technology.

"A lot of the shops that have put in the first-generation UPS, they are coming to the end of life with those," Duggan said. "They are finding their batteries are failing. They hope they are going to work. They've got no visibility into the network."