As customers demand greater visibility, proactive support and long-term technology partnerships, channel partners are looking beyond product resale towards recurring services. Paul Tedford, Head of Service Delivery at Infinigate UK & Ireland, explains how accredited support, network visibility and lifecycle services are helping partners strengthen customer relationships while creating new revenue opportunities.
The role of the channel partner is evolving. Customers no longer view support as something that begins when technology fails. Instead, they increasingly expect partners to remain engaged throughout the entire technology lifecycle, helping optimise performance, improve resilience and strengthen security as business requirements change.
That shift is creating significant opportunities for partners prepared to move beyond traditional resale and develop recurring service-based businesses. However, building those capabilities internally can require considerable investment in technical skills, operational processes and service delivery.
Paul Tedford, Head of Service Delivery at Infinigate UK & Ireland, believes distributors have an increasingly important role to play in helping partners make that transition.
“The biggest challenge is often moving from a product-led model to a repeatable, scalable services business,” he said.
Rather than expecting partners to develop every capability themselves, Tedford believes distributors can provide the technical expertise, enablement and commercial framework needed to accelerate growth.
“Infinigate helps bridge those gaps through technical expertise, enablement and access to proven services that partners can wrap into their own propositions.”
By doing so, partners can expand their portfolios, develop recurring revenue streams and strengthen customer relationships without building every service from scratch.
Visibility drives value
As networks become more distributed through cloud adoption, hybrid working, connected devices and Artificial Intelligence, visibility is becoming increasingly important for both partners and customers.
Tedford believes comprehensive network insight has become fundamental to managing modern IT environments as they continue to grow in scale and complexity.
“Network visibility is crucial. Organisations can’t manage, optimise or secure what they can’t see.”
He explained that customers increasingly need real-time insight into devices, connectivity, network performance and potential vulnerabilities as environments continue to grow in complexity.
“Better visibility helps IT teams identify problems earlier, reduce downtime and make more informed decisions.”
That visibility also enables partners to deliver greater strategic value.
“It gives partners the insight they need to move beyond reactive support and provide customers with more proactive, strategic guidance.”
To address this, Infinigate has incorporated an Auvik-powered Network Assessment Service into its PartnerWorks offering. The service provides automated discovery, live topology mapping, continuous monitoring, traffic insights and configuration visibility, giving partners practical intelligence they can use to identify performance issues, improve resilience and create new customer conversations.
According to Tedford, the assessment also helps partners generate additional margin while strengthening both pre-sales and post-sales engagement.
From support to long-term partnerships
Customer expectations around support are also changing.
Rather than viewing maintenance as a post-deployment activity, organisations increasingly expect partners to provide ongoing optimisation, monitoring and security throughout the technology lifecycle.
Tedford believes this represents one of the biggest commercial opportunities currently available to the channel.
“Customers are increasingly expecting support to continue throughout the technology lifecycle, rather than ending once a product has been deployed,” he said.
They want assistance not only with maintenance but also with monitoring, optimisation and adapting technology as their business evolves, he added.
“For partners, this creates an opportunity to build deeper, longer-term customer relationships and more predictable revenue streams.”
Flexible delivery models are becoming equally important.
“We’re also seeing more demand for flexible models that allow partners to remain the customer’s main point of contact while bringing in specialist expertise and support when needed,” said Tedford.
That approach enables partners to retain ownership of customer relationships while drawing on additional technical capabilities when projects require specialist expertise.
The changing role of distribution
As partner businesses evolve, so too does the role of the value-added distributor.
Tedford believes distribution is moving far beyond logistics and procurement.
“The role of the value-added distributor is becoming much broader,” he said.
While technology access remains important, partners increasingly need assistance with solution design, technical enablement, service delivery and go-to-market strategy.
“This means distributors are becoming an extension of the partner’s own team, helping them add capabilities, enter new markets and scale more quickly.”
For Tedford, the greatest value comes from combining technical expertise with commercial understanding, enabling partners not only to deploy technology successfully but also to build sustainable businesses around it.
Building recurring revenue
Looking ahead, Tedford believes the strongest opportunities will come from helping customers navigate increasing IT complexity.
“The biggest opportunities will come from helping customers manage growing complexity,” he said.
Hybrid working, cloud adoption, connected devices and Artificial Intelligence are placing greater demands on enterprise networks while simultaneously increasing expectations around security and resilience.
“Partners that can bring networking, cybersecurity and ongoing services together will be well positioned,” said Tedford.
Rather than relying on individual projects, he expects more partners to build recurring service portfolios focused on assessment, monitoring, optimisation and lifecycle support.
Infinigate’s own priorities reflect that direction.
“Our biggest priority is helping partners turn their technical expertise into profitable, repeatable services.”
Tedford highlighted the company’s PartnerWorks-enabled support and Auvik-powered Network Assessment Service as examples of practical offerings that enable partners to improve network visibility, expand post-sales support and generate recurring revenue.
More broadly, he said recent leadership appointments, including Kai Grunwitz as Chief Growth Officer and James Baker as Regional Vice President, Cloud and Marketplace, demonstrate Infinigate’s continued investment in expanding differentiated services, strengthening its vendor portfolio and growing its cloud capabilities across multiple geographies.
Ultimately, Tedford believes partners should focus on solving clearly defined customer challenges rather than trying to offer every possible service.
“Start with a clearly defined customer problem and build a repeatable service around it.”
He warned that trying to serve every requirement can quickly erode profitability.
“A focused proposition with clear outcomes, consistent delivery and recurring value is much easier to scale.”
By combining accredited support, proactive network visibility and flexible service delivery, Tedford believes partners have an opportunity to transform support from a necessary operational function into a sustainable engine for long-term growth.
