Westcon-Comstor launches PartnerCentral

Westcon-Comstor has launched PartnerCentral, a multivendor marketplace where Westcon-Comstor partners can configure, quote, and order complex hybrid solutions—software, hardware, services, or a combination of all three. PartnerCentral is much more than a marketplace, representing a transformative shift in the way Westcon-Comstor works with its partners.

PartnerCentral gives Westcon-Comstor partners access to intuitive data insights that makes it more than a simple way to procure services and products. As part of its marketplace capability, Partner Insights gives partners the business and customer insights they need to capitalise on new opportunities and market trends. PartnerCentral is a gateway to Partner Success, where users can better understand their customers’ product lifecycles and be more responsive.

Built in close collaboration with Westcon-Comstor’s leading channel and vendor partners, PartnerCentral has been developed with users in mind and a focus on providing access to educational resources, digital tools and data-driven processes essential to Partner Success.

PartnerCentral is designed to accelerate and simplify the move to cloud and “as-a-service” business models. These can be complex to manage as partners make this transition. PartnerCentral addresses this by:

●   Simplifying the procurement and management of recurring subscription and as-a-service offers at scale, making it easier to provide these services to end customers.

●   Providing a single platform for hybrid procurement, so partners can purchase hardware, software, and services, with a mix of subscriptions and one-off purchases., on platform. This makes the process far simpler despite the potential for increased complexity.

●   Making self-service easy from one intuitive interface, allowing partners to better control procurement, user management, cloud usage and more.

●   Automating pricing, quoting, and ordering processes, improving quote accuracy, speeding up sales cycles and helping track orders with ease.

●   Giving partners access to valuable data insights through Partner Insights, including descriptive analytics to help spot new opportunities, understand customer and wider industry trends, and manage product renewals and subscriptions proactively.

●   Educational tools and materials to give partners the best understanding of the solutions they provide and how to market them.

“Our partners want us to provide a digital interface to help their transformation into more efficient, data-driven businesses. They want insights which help them understand the opportunities before their customers ask for them. They want a marketplace to help them easily procure and manage hardware, software and services. But they have made it very clear through our development process: they don’t want Westcon-Comstor to stop providing the industry-leading value and expertise that has been our hallmark for almost 40 years—and the foundation of Partner Success. We are bringing a new marketplace to the channel community, but we’re doing it in a way which ensures we keep, and build on, our value-added, customer-focused heritage,” said Patrick Aronson, CMO, Westcon-Comstor.

“With PartnerCentral, we’re building on the business transformation journey we have been on for the last five years, shifting to the second wave of a more automated, digital engagement. In doing this we are giving our partners the support they need to evolve their offerings at the right time and at the right pace. We need to give them the tools to succeed and ensure they have access to data and educational resources they need to serve their customers in a changing and demanding market,” added Rakesh Parbhoo, CTO, Westcon-Comstor.

“Using PartnerCentral has been transformative. We’ve significantly streamlined our engagement with key suppliers and simplified our sale-to-order process. Rather than the typical three-to-four days to complete, our deals are now closed in a single day. It’s truly a great customer experience,” said Geof Robinson, Chief Technology Officer, Telesmart Ltd, New Zealand.

“Partner Insights is a gamechanger, providing access to a clear, intuitive dashboard with a comprehensive view into our business data. This not only gives us easy to use, additional management information but also allows us to identify trends and provides actionable insights on future growth opportunities. We're excited to partner with Westcon-Comstor as they continue to evolve this platform to meet our expanding needs,” said Amit Samani, Director, NTT Global Procurement.