Intel Throws 'Inside' Pitch
The Santa Clara, Calif.-based chip maker unveiled its aggressive new channel and product plans to partners at the annual Intel Solution Summit in Las Vegas.
The Broad Reach Advertising Pilot will launch in eight U.S. cities and include between six and eight Intel Premier Providers who will pool their Intel Inside marketing funds to buy full-page advertisements in local business journals, said Steve Dallman, Intel's director of Americas distribution and channel marketing.
Dallman said Intel has also eliminated several bureaucratic obstacles for partners trying to obtain marketing and advertising funds in an effort to increase participation in the three-year-old program.
The changes were explained in detail to 600 Intel partners from about 300 channel companies and included the company's first, in-person explanation of its new Channel Products Group, headed by Intel Vice President Bill Siu.
"What the Channel Products Group does is it puts all this under one management structure--the group I'm responsible for," Siu said. "And also, by bringing it to the executive office level, Intel raises the visibility of the channel. It's not a recreational business within Intel--the channel. The numbers are huge."
The explanation of Intel's reorganization resonated with Ted Roller, co-owner of Quanexus, a Dayton, Ohio-based system builder formed when Roller's previous company, Oxford Systems Integration, merged with another company, PCS.
Roller believed the new Intel Inside effort would be a plus. "Intel has done a good job of selling to the channel," he said. "But selling to the channel's customers is something new. It will probably work out well," he said.
Siu also provided details of the company's forthcoming jump to dual-core processing and virtualization technology, details that were met with a generally upbeat reaction.
"I'm excited by it," said James Huang, a product specialist at Amax Information Technology, a Fremont, Calif.-based system builder. "It's going to help sales," he said.