Cisco Canada sees a “perfect storm” driving multi-year infrastructure refresh скачать в хорошем качестве

Cisco Canada sees a “perfect storm” driving multi-year infrastructure refresh

(https://i0.wp.com/channelbuzz.ca/wp-c...) Erin Gertner, vice president of the Partner Organization and SMB Sales at Cisco Canada When Cisco CEO Chuck Robbins told investors the campus and data centre refresh is at “the top of the first inning” of a multi-year, multibillion-dollar opportunity, it raised an obvious question for Canadian partners: what does that inning look like here? Erin Gertner, vice president of the Partner Organization and SMB Sales at Cisco Canada (https://www.cisco.com/site/ca/en/inde...) , says Canada is tracking with the global trend – and that the opportunity is being driven by a “perfect storm” of three converging forces: the largest last-day-of-support (LDOS) wave Cisco has seen in years, growing urgency around AI readiness, and increasing pressure around data sovereignty. The AI readiness gap (https://www.cisco.com/c/m/en_us/solut...) is particularly striking. Only 7% of Canadian organizations say they’re fully prepared to deploy AI – down from 9% the previous year – while 96% say the urgency has increased. That tension is creating real opportunities for partners who can lead with outcomes rather than product. Gertner says the partners winning the biggest deals are those taking a consultative approach – running assessments, broadening the conversation beyond a like-for-like swap, and helping customers understand their full security and AI readiness posture. In one example, a security assessment nearly quadrupled the deal size compared to a straight hardware refresh. The conversation also touches on where vertical demand is hottest (financial services and healthcare are leading), how the Secure AI Factory with NVIDIA (https://blogs.cisco.com/partner/cisco...) translates for mid-market partners, the role of data sovereignty in driving on-prem modernization, and what smaller MSPs should be doing to get in the game. Gertner’s advice to partners who haven’t started? Reach out to your Cisco partner account manager or distributor and get access to the PXP data – the opportunity is there, and Cisco wants to make it easy to find. Read Full Transcript Robert Dutt: Hello and welcome to In The Channel from ChannelBuzz.ca, bringing news and information to the Canadian IT channel community for the last 16 years. I’m Robert Dutt, editor of ChannelBuzz.ca, and as always, your host for the show. On Cisco’s most recent earnings call, CEO Chuck Robbins called the campus and data centre refresh the top of the first inning of a multi-year, multi-billion dollar opportunity. Double-digit growth in networking, six consecutive quarters. But that’s the global picture. What does the first inning look like in Canada? My guest today is Erin Gertner, VP of the Partner Organization and SMB Sales for Cisco Canada. Erin sees what she calls a “perfect storm” converging right now – a massive wave of aging infrastructure hitting last day of support, growing urgency around AI readiness, and increasing pressure around data sovereignty. We get into what Cisco Canada is seeing on the ground, where partners are finding the most traction, and what separates the ones winning those deals from the ones leaving the door open for somebody else. Let’s get right into it. My chat with Erin Gertner. Erin, thanks for taking the time. I appreciate it. Erin Gertner: Thank you so much, and thank you for having me, Robert. It’s nice to see you. Robert Dutt: Nice to see you as well. It’s been a little while since Partner Summit when last we sat down, but I wanted to chat because of Chuck’s comments on the earnings call, talking about the top of the first inning on a multi-year, multi-billion dollar opportunity around campus refresh. Double-digit growth in networking for six consecutive quarters. That’s the global picture. I guess to throw it open, what does that top of the first inning look like from where Cisco Canada sits? Are we tracking with the US on this one? Are we still back in spring training? What does the Canadian opportunity look like in this moment? Erin Gertner: I think we’re seeing something very similar to what Chuck spoke about on the earnings call. We are seeing a multi-year, multi-billion dollar refresh cycle taking place here in Canada. And I think it is the perfect storm of three things coming together. One, we have a lot of aged infrastructure out there. Sometimes we call it last day of support, or LDOS. When we look in our portfolio, we’ve got the largest LDOS opportunity that we’ve had in many, many years this year and next year. We’ve been working with many of our partners as well as our account teams to start going out and pursuing those opportunities because we really do need to get in front of them. But we’re also seeing the dynamics of a few other things taking place. One is AI readiness. I think you probably heard i...