Redmond View
May 26, 2010
Microsoft Partner Network Launches New Competencies and Subscriptions
Partners! Today we’ve hit a major milestone as we evolve to the Microsoft Partner Network. I’m happy to announce we’ve officially retired our previous competencies and specializations - and launched new competencies, a new subscription, and enhanced a long-time favorite subscription.
Registered partners – check out Microsoft Action Pack Solution Provider and Microsoft Action Pack Development and Design, which provide access to the latest Microsoft technology and resources to help you be at the top of your game.
Gold Certified and Certified partners - while we changed the competency structure (you can see it here), your current benefits will continue until you re-enroll. After October 2010, the new competencies will offer a range of tailored benefits (software, learning, marketing, and sales assets) along with to the ability to create a customizable logo to articulate your strengths to your customers.
I want to highlight a major change for partners earning a competency or advanced competency. New requirements state that you must be current on the latest Microsoft technology. Why? Because customers and partners requested we raise the bar. As partners, you are our voice and advocate to customers on the latest technology, so it is critical that you deeply know and use the latest technology yourself. To help, we will provide hands-on experience with beta releases and early adoption programs, and offer training for your staff with role-based learning paths, as well as online and in-person classroom training.
I encourage you to review the specifics of the new competencies and requirements and make sure that you understand the changes we’re making. To see the latest information, download and review the Value of Earning a Microsoft Competency Guide. We update the Guide regularly (usually monthly), so make sure you review the latest edition.
Take Advantage of Exclusive Partner Offers
We’ve created a couple of great offers to help with passing the latest exams. If you are re-enrolling now through June 30, take advantage of the Microsoft Learning Second Shot offer. Until June 30, 2010, you can register to retake any IT Pro or Developer exam for free if you don’t pass on your first attempt. To help you prepare, you also get free access to Safari books’ vast online technical book library for 30 days. Visit Prometric, Microsoft's official testing partner, to get started today.
As a special bonus, the “WPC 5-for-1 Exam Pass” is exclusively available to WPC 2010 attendees. It lets an individual take up to five exams until October 10, 2010 for the regular price of one exam in your home country. Each partner location can purchase up to four of these passes. This offer starts July 11, 2010, and can be redeemed worldwide at Prometric Testing Centers for all IT Pro, Developer, and Dynamics exams. Whether you are looking to maintain your existing competencies or upgrade to an advanced competency, this is the best offer you’ll find to help you meet the new requirements. Visit the Microsoft Partner Network booth at WPC 2010 to purchase your passes.
Join Us at WPC 2010 and Digital WPC
Finally, we encourage all of you to attend WPC 2010 from July 12-15 to learn more about the changes to the Microsoft Partner Network. This is the must-attend event of the year for partners to hear about the latest Microsoft products, innovations, and solutions. If you can’t attend the event in person, check out Digital WPC.
And for those looking to profit from the cloud, we are offering over 200 sessions at WPC this year to help you understand Microsoft’s cloud offering. It’s a great opportunity to build new partner relationships and enhance the ones you already have with partners and Microsoft. There are so many great reasons to attend. I hope to see you there!
For even more information about the recent changes, check out my new video, Infinite Possibilities with the Microsoft Partner Network. Questions? We value your input, so please let us know what you think by leaving a comment. –-Julie Bennani, General Manager, Microsoft Partner Network
May 19, 2010
Schedule Meetings with WPC Connect
If you’re attending WPC, (and I hope that you are), we’ve got some great tools to enhance your experience. You can schedule meetings in advance using WPC Connect and the new Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC) Connect Wall. The wall allows you to see a large number of photos in a single screen - making it easy to search for a particular person. Be part of this unique networking opportunity, and get your profile on the WPC Connect Wall today! --AW
May 18, 2010
Microsoft Releases Virtualization Partner Profitability Toolkit
Every partner knows about the great opportunity to sell virtualization technology and services. For a while, that meant one thing: working exclusively with VMware.
Times have changed.
Microsoft’s virtualization technology is more affordable and seen by many as technically comparable, and the company is gaining market share. Indeed, Microsoft Hyper-V continued its ascent in Q409, growing 215 percent year over year, according to the market research firm, IDC.
Nearly every VMware partner we talk to recognizes that Microsoft is a major player in virtualization and tells us they would like an opportunity to build a virtualization practice that includes both VMware and Microsoft. They recognize that having a dual practice allows them to become more trusted advisors to their customers. But they want a way to better understand the economic model.
To that end, Microsoft today is announcing a new virtualization partner profitability toolkit. The kit, available here on the Microsoft Partner Network, contains a profitability modeling tool that partners can use to see exactly how much adding a Microsoft practice can mean to their business. It’s basically an interactive spreadsheet, built with midsize business customers in mind, to help partners visualize the economic differences of doing project work around technology from one vendor versus being technology agnostic and building a virtualization practice that makes use of technology from multiple vendors.
What will you find when you use the tool? As much as we’d like to tell you otherwise, if you plug in the numbers to look at your work on a project by project basis, the numbers could favor VMware. But if you take a practice-level view and look at the numbers over the long term, the tool is likely to show partners making far more money with Microsoft. The logic here is pretty simple. Microsoft virtualization offerings are 3 to 5 times less expensive than VMware so partners can sell more of it, and there are some great follow-on project opportunities to add value for customers in security, integrated management, operating system and application upgrades, moving toward desktop virtualization and the cloud, and so forth.
The takeaway from all of this is pretty simple. If you’re just selling VMware today, then you are in the VMware business. If you want to be in the virtualization business, look at building a virtualization practice where you’re technology agnostic and offering more choice to customers. The new virtualization partner profitability tool can help you see the advantages in this approach. Download it today! --David Greschler, Director Virtualization Strategy, Microsoft
May 12, 2010
Office 2010 and SharePoint 2010 Global Launch Today!
What an exciting day at Microsoft! Today marks one of the biggest moments for Microsoft in 2010 – the global launch of our new productivity products including Microsoft Office 2010 and Microsoft SharePoint 2010.
This morning Stephen Elop led a launch event in New York to officially introduce these products to the world. They truly deliver the next generation in productivity software with numerous innovations that create a rich user experience across the PC, the browser, and the cloud – and the response so far has been phenomenal.
No other set of productivity tools can deliver such rich experiences across an array of formats. They empower you to best meet your customer’s needs and embrace the changing technology landscape featuring the cloud. The launch of Office 2010 and SharePoint 2010 represents a huge opportunity for Microsoft partners, and to make sure that you are ready, you should start by taking the following actions:
1. Get more information and access resources about these products through the Virtual Launch Site and the Office 2010 and SharePoint 2010 pages on the Microsoft Partner Network website.
2. Start using these products internally to take advantage of everything they have to offer and gain first-hand experience you can leverage when selling and creating solutions for your customers.
3. Take sales or technical trainings at the Partner Learning Center to ensure you are up to speed on the latest software.
4. Use the Partner Marketing Center to access sales and marketing resources through the various campaigns including the Office 2010 Launch-in-a-Box, Business Productivity Infrastructure Optimization, and Upgrade the Desktop among others.
5. ISV partners, make sure your applications are ready for the latest platforms at www.isvappcompat.com.
Thank you for your partnership with Microsoft and I hope to see you in two months at WPC in Washington, D.C.! --AW
May 5, 2010
SQL Server 2008 R2 Now Available to MSDN and TechNet Subscribers
I’m glad to share with you the availability of Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 for MSDN and TechNet subscribers. For subscribers, SQL Server 2008 R2 is now available in the following editions: Enterprise, Standard, Web, Workgroup and Developer (English Language availability only). To get started, visit MSDN Subscriptions and TechNet subscriptions. Microsoft partners can also download the software from the Partner Portal.
And,if you couldn’t attend one of the many worldwide SQL Server 2008 R2 launch events, get a SQL Server 2008 R2 Digital Tour. --AW
