In a bid to accelerate its cloud partner program momentum, Oracle is offering rebates to partners that work with value-added distributors (VADs), the technology giant said during an Oracle CloudWorld conference today in New York City.
The rebates apparently are part of Oracle's Resale partner strategy -- within the broader Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) Specialized program. Cloud updates designed for partners are set to surface in February.
In the meantime -- and perhaps for the long haul -- there are two types of rebates or discounts that partners should grab, ChannelE2E believes.
In a resale relationship, Oracle offers partners a discount (about 10 percent, though it can vary) because the partner owns the end-customer relationship. From there, the partner can negotiate any end-cost price with the end-customer.
Rebates for VAD-Registered Deals
But the partner margins get extra interesting once a VAD is involved in a registered partner deal. In that scenario, Oracle is offering an additional 10 percent discount (roughly) to the partner -- a rebate, apparently, -- for registered deals that through through distributors. The partner must close the registered deal to qualify for that 10 percent discount.
It sounds like Oracle plans to adjust the discount over time -- offering 3 percent standard, with 7 percent shifted to specific cloud services from quarter to quarter, in order to drive partners to promote specific cloud offerings during certain quarters.
The numbers above are rough estimates shared during a breakout session at Oracle CloudWorld in Manhattan today. Tim Dwyer, director of cloud go to market at Oracle, walked attendees through various recurring revenue scenarios at the conference.
The big theme throughout the conference involved Oracle's end-to-end cloud offerings. The company claimed that it has the most complete portfolio of IaaS, PaaS and SaaS solutions. And Oracle event claimed it could beat Amazon Web Services on price.
While Amazon is known for base IaaS, Dwyer told partners to look at the overall cloud stack. Oracle databases running on the Oracle cloud, for instance, cost one-third less than Oracle databases running on the Amazon cloud because Oracle controls its own stack, Dwyer asserted.
ChannelE2E has not performed an independent Oracle vs AWS Cloud cost comparison.
Value-Added Distributors and Oracle Cloud
In the channel, some partners wonder why Oracle offer extra perks to partners that work through two-tier distribution -- rather than engaging directly with Oracle?
The short answer involves all of the benefits that VADs offer to both Oracle and the partners. For instance, VADs offer strong market and sales support -- and can help partners to get up to speed on Oracle's cloud offerings, Dwyer mentioned.
Check in directly with your Oracle value-added distributor for more information about potential rebates or perks. And be sure to ask Oracle about the company's Referral, Co-Sell/Implementation and Resale programs for cloud partners. Dwyer mentioned each program in detail during the conference.
