AT&T Partner Solutions (APS) unveiled a sweeping set of new tools and introduced its new leader to the channel last week.
AT&T’s main indirect sales organization announced multiple enhancements to its Partner Exchange, Alliance Channel and ACC Business programs. In the meantime, newly appointed leader Stacey Marx met with channel partners at the recent Channel Partners Conference & Expo, as Zee Hussain bade farewell. Sara Straley, assistant vice president of sales and marketing for AT&T Partner Exchange, was also on hand after accepting the new position earlier this year.
The enhancements and changes range from program-specific to overarching all of AT&T Partner Solutions. Partner Exchange, Alliance Channel and ACC Business will each benefit from AT&T Fiber Fast, a tool partners will use to tell their customers how long it will take to light up a building with fiber, whether that be five, 15 or 50 days.
AT&T’s Kevin Leonard
“We’re investing in fiber more than anyone else, so that lead is expanding,” said Kevin Leonard, AT&T Business’ vice president of alternate channels. “It’s only valuable if you get it to the customers.”
The Alliance Channel, which Leonard leads, has finished its FirstNet first-responders program pilot and made it available to more solution providers. AT&T invited a select number of partners to take part last summer . They’ll support a mobile network for public-safety organizations.
Alliance Channel members also got their hands on Vista, a long-demanded tool that helps them keep track of order information.
Leonard’s program, along with ACC Business, got their hands on SD-WAN Now. AT&T’s VeloCloud-powered SD-WAN platform remains the same, but the new service streamlines and expedites the process from sales to deployment. Leonard said the entire process will take 30 days. Zee Hussain told us that partner feedback led to the new tool.
AT&T’s Zee Hussain
“We’ve had an SD-WAN solution in the market for quite some time, but what our partners told us was, ‘It’s cumbersome. It’s slow. What we need from you is to build us something where we can price it quickly, design it quickly, contract it quickly and implement it quickly,’” Hussain said.
ACC, which Hussain said traditionally is known for providing network connectivity, is expanding its portfolio. He said solution providers in the program and their customers have asked for more complete solutions. AT&T has made SD-WAN, voice platform and broadband backup available for ACC. The portfolio additions will be “transformational” for partners when engaging a customer.
“Before, they might just stop at an internet connection,” Hussain said. “Now they can say, ‘We’ll sell you voice over the top; we’ll sell you SD-WAN connectivity; we can sell you broadband backup.”
AT&T Partner Exchange also is expanding its portfolio. The reseller program continues to build its IoT and mobility practices. Solution providers can sell Harman Spark, a connected car device that can assist drivers in a variety of ways, including creating a Wi-Fi hotspot. AT&T also unveiled an Asset Management Operations Center and a cloud-hosted IoT service called DataFlow.
For more comprehensive list of the announcements, see AT&T’s news release.
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