Polycom brings "Value" to Customers and Partners!

Polycom has been a global leader in video conferencing (VC) and audio conferencing fortunately for a very long time. Neeraj Gill, MD - India & SAARC, Polycom (UK) India, shares, "In fact today in terms of conference phones world wide, we have actually about 85% market share and are the market leaders in  video conferencing." 

Core competencies

The vendor claims that Polycom becomes the most appropriate choice for any customer or channel partner when it comes to video or audio conferencing because of their open standard technology. Polycom can integrate any large IT vendor solutions today. For example, if we talk about Unified Communications then Polycom technology and solutions today are incorporable to a very large number of vendors be it Microsoft or IBM. "Since we are based on the open standards the customer has the choice and flexibility of choosing Polycom technology and working it in into a number of UC solutions," adds Gill. The flexibility that it allows a customer to choose the best of breed solutions from Polycom and other IT vendors gives strength to their partners’ also who can then build the best of breed solutions meeting varied customers requirements.

Since building solutions or vendor neutrality of Polycom solutions need to be well taught to their partners on board, Polycom incorporates a number of initiatives like face to face trainings. "We have a dedicated channel team here which focuses on training channel partners specifically in terms of technologies, that comprises of positioning technology i.e. how the technology benefits the customer, customer needs to be understand where the technology can be applied and what are the business benefits that the technology offers," explains Gill. Polycom not only educates the partners about their technology but help them position it vis-à-vis competition. On top of all that, they have the web based programs for the channel partners to brush up their soft skills.

Globally, they have done certification courses where channel partners actually send technical team members from their own organization to actually get certified. Similar certification programs also happen in India too. To conclude, one can say that Polycom prepares their channel partners either through web based certification or face to face trainings or both, to enable them to go out and be in the market place. 

Current channel base 

In India they have got a 2-tier channel presence. On the top are logistics as well as value added distributors followed by channel partners who go and sell to the customers. As of today, they have got 60+ active channel partners across the country both in voice and video spectrum which are separate from the distributor spectrum.

"We have got an excellent channel base. I don't see the necessity of expanding it. Rather, I see the necessity in concentrating on the channel base we have got and providing them more value so that they benefit as the market is coming out of the recession and the Indian market is getting stronger and stronger," opines Gill. They provide all of the weapons needed to the channel partners to go out and makes sure that the business comes to them in return to Polycom. 

Polycom solutions in India 

The Government in APAC, particularly in India continues to be one of the largest users of VC technology. While Polycom is not directly participating in any kind of e-governance activities but they claim to be the technology enabler to the government. "We call ourselves as an enabler of communication be it Government or any enterprise," informs Gill.

There are multiple flavours of desktop  video communication  today. Speaking about this technology Gill informs, "One can actually have a desktop video communication on their laptops too. Currently we already have solutions deployed in the market place. Our CMA application actually does provide that successfully. Other than that we have also got high-definition desktop-based video conferencing solutions which are termed today as desktop telepresence solutions. Both are there in the market and doing very well."

By and large room based executive tele-presence systems are sold largely to large enterprises and government organizations. And the CMAs can be deployed very effectively at the SME level.

In the end...

As any channel based company, Polycom does certify its channel partners to provide tier I and II services. So, in India, most of the customers would actually have channel partners as the frontend who can provide services both on VC as well as infrastructure products. As a result they have got support in all the tier II and tier III cities of the country also. Polycom also links its backend services with the APAC support team. 

"We are looking at adding more certifications to our channel base," informs Gill. The market for VC is growing in the country. And Polycom is ready with partner certifications for building VC Infrastructure and VC solutions.

For more contact :
beenish@varindia.com