Exclusive Networks has successfully won over sceptics of its new ServiceNow partnership, the exec tasked with building a 70-strong team dedicated to the vendor has claimed.
The Paris-based VAD began handling ServiceNow’s 600-700 newly classified ‘Indirect’ partners in EMEA on 1 October as it switched to a multi-tier channel model in the region.
Only around six of ServiceNow’s largest Global Elite and Elite partners in the region will continue to transact directly with the vendor, which has handed all sub-1,000 customers to the channel.
Exclusive’s appointment in July was greeted with some scepticism, Claudette Atkinson, Global General Manager – ServiceNow at Exclusive Networks, acknowledged.
“On paper, initially everyone was going, ‘oh, that doesn’t make sense’,” she told IT Channel Oxygen.
“But [ServiceNow’s] growth accelerator is around the AI story and also – more specifically – cybersecurity and autonomous security.
“When you look at it like that, it absolutely makes sense they’d want to partner with Exclusive Networks as the largest global cyber security distributor.”
“Crazy, but crazy-good”
Although it will sell ServiceNow’s entire portfolio, Exclusive will focus on driving the $14bn-revenue vendor’s Armis and Veza cyber offerings into both ServiceNow’s ITSM partners and Exclusive’s cyber partners, Atkinson said.
ServiceNow partners used to dealing with the NYSE-listed vendor directly will see few practical differences, she claimed.
“If they’ve got a customer they’re talking to, and there is an AE [account executive] attached to that opportunity, which generally there is, they’ll still be speaking to them about shaping the deal, understanding the modelling of what that customer needs and what products they should be buying,” she said.
“The practical difference is that the order form, which would have gone straight to a partner or ServiceNow, now comes to distribution for Indirect partners.”
ServiceNow is “complementary” to Exclusive’s existing vendors, Atkinson claimed, stressing that it is in the process of building “hero plays” that combine ServiceNow with Fortinet and other key vendors.
She is in the process of recruiting 70 staff across EMEA, including scores of inside sales, renewals, vendor specialists and territory managers in Dublin.
“All of this is aligned with the way ServiceNow goes to market,” she said.
“They talk about their renewal rate being at 98%. That’s something we have to try and emulate.”
In their first two days of trading, ServiceNow and Exclusive have got off to a “crazy, but crazy-good” start, Atkinson claimed.
“We are their quoting engine. We have to build our skill set around IT workflow – I think we would have struggled to spell ITSM a few weeks ago,” she said.
ServiceNow in May set itself the goal of hitting $30bn subscription revenue by 2030.
“Obviously they own the enterprise, and that’s what they want their guys to be focused on,” she said.
“But from the midmarket downwards, they need a scaling engine. And that is Exclusive, effectively.”
What else did Atkinson say? The full interview starts on the next page…
