By Editor
Over two years ago, the SonicWALL acquisition expanded Dell’s security software and services portfolio and since then the company has carefully gone ahead with the integration of the entire SonicWall business into the Dell ecosystem Shahnawaz Sheikh, Regional Director for Middle East, North Africa and Turkey at Dell Sonicwall discusses the company’s focus on the Saudi Market
Discuss growth outlook in the Kingdom and how has the 1st quarter sales been?
With local team on the ground, Saudi Arabia has been an important and fast growing market of us. The business has had a fast paced start in the kingdom this year and we are confident that it progresses at a good pace for remaining quarters in this year.
Has the growth been more in enterprise or in SMB?
The growth has been more in the enterprise space, with the growing opportunities in the market and a high potential for Next Generation Firewalls in the mid to enterprise market segment. Our penetration in the mid enterprise customer base is rapidly and evenly growing across major cities in the Kingdom. Having said this, we continue to hold our leadership and grow our SMB business by getting on-board and enabling the right partners that value the partnership and proactively contribute towards growing SMB business.
Discuss your engagement with the channel thorough regular initiatives?
Channel enablement is the key focus and we continuously strive hard to enable the partners by delivering sales tracks, technical and certification trainings, providing access to various business tools and supporting their businesses with demo equipments and technical capabilities. The whole enablement program addresses the multitude of business areas to polish our partners with desired skills that our customers would expect from them to deliver.
We did have a few partners from Saudi Arabia attending the conference. Some of the partners who were recognized and rewarded were excited to be part of the conference and were happy to get the recognition and honor.
Are you seeking more partners there or looking to consolidate?
With the launch of the new partner program, we are in the process of reviewing our existing partners and recruiting the desired number of partners that are needed to support the business. We are very cautious not to over-crowd the market with excess of partnerships that could hamper the profitability and growth potential for partners who have invested in our business.
Do you have partners of various profiles and strengths in the KSA market?
Yes indeed, our partners are of mixed capabilities, some with financial capability to execute projects of any sizes and some with exceptionally good technical skills that differentiates them from the rest. We have a good mix of variety here and both of these type of partners are an asset to our business. We leverage both types of partners to use their skills, financial and political reach that helps in keeping our enterprise and SMB customers happy as they have choices to make depending on what their need is. We have consolidated the list of partners and presently work with 6 -8 key enterprise partners and 12 – 15 SMB partners to support the business growth across the kingdom of Saud Arabia.