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"Voice on the IP network has been a breakthrough for Cisco," said Richard McLeod, director of unified communications solutions for worldwide channels at Cisco. The company garnered the highest ratings in technical and channel program satisfaction, and its composite Channel Champions rating of 77.5 put it two-tenths of a point ahead of runner-up Avaya with 77.3. Next came 3Com with 73.7 and Nortel with 73.2. It was not a clean sweep for Cisco. But where it was strong, it was very strong. Cisco pulled 4.2 points ahead in technical education, reflecting high partner satisfaction with its vaunted training program. It also won for product quality and reliability, service revenue opportunities and keeping partners informed. Cisco's strength in education and channel communications didn't surprise partners. "Cisco has had a harder job to do converting data partners into voice partners than any other vendor," said Paul Freeman, president of Coast Solutions Group, Irvine, Calif., a longtime Cisco IP telephony partner. "It's been tough, and they had to do a great job. They know they have a ways to go still, and they are working diligently to help classic data partners become voice partners." Cisco slipped behind both Avaya and 3Com in areas of price/performance and margins and rebates, and it was bested by Avaya in management features, total ROI and reducing or eliminating channel conflict. Robert Keblusek, senior vice president at Sentinel Technologies, Downers Grove, Ill., said Cisco could do a better job of protecting partners. He said it was not uncommon for Cisco to bring in three different partners to compete for the same VoIP deal. "It's something that an area sales organization could take a look at and, for a partner that made a significant investment, try to protect them before it goes out to bid," he said. Nevertheless, partners have no complaints about the quality of Cisco's products or its training programs, and that combination made it a Channel Champion..  |
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