Investing In The Future: Netcordia Expands Partner Program

Calence, a solution provider in Tempe, Ariz., is one of the latest partners to sign on with Netcordia to use its NetMRI line of network management and assessment appliances as part of its own services and product offerings.

"We were really looking for a best-in-class tool to help us automate our network assessment offerings, and this was one of the only tools that had targeted this area with any level of thoroughness," said Brett Rushton, vice president of network strategy and infrastructure at Calence.

Rushton estimates that using NetMRI has created at least a 50 percent time savings for Calence in performing network assessments.

Netcordia has added 10 solution providers in the past few weeks, bringing its total to about 40 partners, said Paul Markun, vice president of marketing at the Annapolis, Md.-based company. "We'd like to add another 15 before the end of the year," he said.

The vendor's Netcordia Channel Partner Program includes a deal-registration initiative that offers extra discounts to participating partners, lead-generation efforts and a Web portal with support and training materials.

On the lead-generation front, the company recently doubled its telesales force to find more sales opportunities and pass them along to its channel partners, Markun said.

In addition, the company recently hired a dedicated channel manager to help tighten ties with its partners.

Much of the recent flurry of channel activity comes as a result of a $10 million funding infusion Netcordia garnered in July. The Series B funding round was led by venture capital firm Trinity Ventures, along with Novak Biddle Venture Partners, which already has invested in the company. To date, Netcordia has raised $13 million in financing.

In addition to its channel efforts, the new funding also will go to support Netcordia's product development efforts. The NetMRI appliances bundle in an operating system, Web server, rules database and best practices into a single box. It automatically discovers a network's topology, examining device configuration and setup and looks for potential problems before they impact network performance.