Sophos Enhances Partner Programme for MEA

Sophos, a global leader in network and endpoint security has announced a new partner programme for resellers in the Middle East and Africa (MEA), to help channel partners achieve their growth objectives with competitive margins, dedicated marketing and sales support, deal registration protection, sales tools, training and certification and other programmes.

The core objective of the Sophos partner programme is to equip partners with resources and training that enable them to sell, market, distribute and implement the company’s award-winning cloud, network, server and end user protection solutions to organizations of all sizes.

The new Sophos partner programme provides access to the company’s comprehensive portfolio of market-leading endpoint and network security products, which have been engineered keeping its partners in mind. Partners are now able to manage all Sophos solutions for every customer through a centralized management platform, Sophos Central. Within Sophos Central is Sophos Central-Partner, a specialized dashboard that allows partners to distribute licenses, add new customers on demand, cross- and up sell services, drive recurring revenue and have a clear, real-time perspective on all customer activity. Partners can respond to security incidents faster and track alerts of all levels directly from the dashboard, so time spent handling incidents, including minor ones, is more productive and effective.

The Sophos Central-Partner dashboard integrates with Professional Service Automation (PSA) software, and partners’ can tie-in and customize Remote Monitoring and Management (RMM) software from leading vendors to deploy and update Sophos agents locally.

This unlocks new avenues for all partners (Cyberoam and Sophos) to start selling abroad and powerful portfolio of IT security products allowing partners to deliver a “complete security” and a “synchronized security” solution to their customers. This partner program actively reflects Sophos’s commitment to help partners sell next-generation IT security technology to address today’s sophisticated threats. Partners have a great opportunity to grow their business by making the most of the demand for advanced IT security solutions and also exploring the clear up sell and cross-sell opportunities within existing customers.

Speaking on the development, Vice President, MEA, Sophos, Harish Chib said: “We realise there is tremendous diversity when it comes to selling approaches adopted by our security partners in the Middle East and Africa. We have developed our MEA Partner Program with feedback from our distributors and resellers and this collaboration has resulted in the introduction of a four-Level partner program that reflects our deep commitment towards partner engagement and their growth. This program will also bring Cyberoam and Sophos partners into one program which is more efficient for our partners.”

Commenting on Sophos’s channel first strategy he further added, “Sophos is the most channel/partner-focused IT security company in the world and sells exclusively through its channel of more than 20,000 resellers worldwide and is dedicated to the growth and success of partners. As part of the new programme and Sophos’ “channel first, channel only” business strategy, the company offers partners sales consulting training and certification, co-branded marketing assets, 24/7 support and in-depth Sophos Central dashboard training to help build the skills and expertise of its partners.”

According to Chib, the new partner programme consists of four levels (Authorized Entry Level, Silver, Gold and Platinum) based on sales performance each level increases in commitment to selling Sophos products and value delivered to customers.

The programme includes offerings such as simple deal registration and discount structure, strong product and solutions portfolio and sales and marketing tools and training and certification.