Silver Peak today announced it is adding an Authorized Deployment Partner (ADP) Program aimed primarily at IT services firms that don’t resell network infrastructure.
The goal of the program is to increase the base of partners focused on professional services opportunities stemming from the deployment of software-defined wide area networks (SD-WANs), says Nick Martin, senior director for deployment engineering at Silver Peak.
The decision to focus the program on partners that are services-led was driven in part to increase the global reach of the professional services that Silver Peak can offer customers in a way that didn’t foster channel conflict, says Martin.
Martin says Silver Peak envisions the program promoting alliances between different classes of Silver Peak partners.
Partner participating in the ADP Program can be of any size, but they will have to demonstrate SD-WAN expertise, says Martin.
“We want these partners to be self-sufficient,” says Martin. “They can’t always be looking to us for help.”
Partners that have already signed up for the program include Cavell Group, FireOwls Corporation, Geode Networks, Traversa Solutions and Velociti.
Thus far, Silver Peak claims to have over 1,000 customers that have opted to deploy its SD-WAN as an alternative to routers. The ADP program comes on the heels of a $90 million infusion of capital into Silver Peak, which is trying to wrest control of branch offices away from rivals such as Cisco and Riverbed Technology.
It may take a few more years for the transition to SD-WANs in the branch office to fully play out. But many partners are seizing on that opportunity to deliver a variety of managed services across those SD-WANs. In fact, in some cases, the partner retains ownership of the underlying network infrastructure in much the same way telecommunications carriers have historically delivered services based on customer premise equipment (CPE) they install and manage.
Many of those same carriers are now aggressively moving into SD-WANs, thereby setting up an inevitable showdown with many traditional networking solution providers. Of course, the conflict between networking solution providers and carriers isn’t anything new. It’s just that the stakes in an SD-WAN market expected to be valued at $2.5 billion by 2021 are now a lot higher.
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