Opportunities in AI and growth in the enterprise market: Partners react to Juniper Networks' 2023 partner summit
We hear from three Juniper partners who gave their thoughts following the vendor’s recent event in Madrid
AI, networking and cloud vendor Juniper Networks hosted its executive partner summit in Madrid, Spain last week.
CRN spoke with several partners to hear their thoughts on what Juniper unveiled during the two-day event.
One of the leading announcements was the evolution of its global Juniper Partner Advantage (JPA) Programme.
After introducing a new Elite Plus Partner Tier last year, Juniper announced a few shakeups to the JPA with the aim of helping partners deliver innovative solutions to customers through managed services.
Here's what three Juniper channel partners thought of the changes and what they make of the vendor's strategy for the year ahead.
nLogic
What was your biggest takeaway from the summit?
"It's been a few years since I have been at an event with Juniper and it impressed me to see how they actually are changing and how they are improving," said Esben Dahl-Nielsen, CEO of Denmark for nLogic, a Norwegian-HQ solution provider.
"The marketing presentation, the promises on how to create more brand awareness for Juniper is the best I have seen for Juniper ever, and also some of the best I have seen with any partner or with any hardware vendor before.
"They've cut away some of the technical stuff and are focusing more on what this means for the end users.
"The other thing is the whole market opportunity.
"With its portfolio and the whole story about artificial intelligence for enterprises, it's just hitting. It's going to hit a nerve and is doing it already. So we already see growth for Juniper and I think that will continue."
What do you think about the Juniper Partner Advantage Programme?
"I think it's too early to tell how it will affect my company in detail. Overall I think it's a positive change but I think we need to talk in six months and I can tell you how it actually affected us."
What do you make of Juniper's strategy and how it affects your business?
"Juniper has two main market segments. They have been strong for many years in the service provider segment - selling to all the big telcos - and then also they have been present in the enterprise market, where I think they will become even stronger.
"I think there is a job to be done on aligning the channels for the service providers and for the enterprise customers. A company like ours is selling to both and that can be sometimes a little bit difficult to see how to work with Juniper.
"We've worked with Juniper for many years but it's an area I would expect to see the partner programme streamlining a little bit more over time."
Continue reading to hear about the potential of AI and how Juniper's solutions are ahead...
Opportunities in AI and growth in the enterprise market: Partners react to Juniper Networks' 2023 partner summit
We hear from three Juniper partners who gave their thoughts following the vendor’s recent event in Madrid
Nomios Group
What was your biggest takeaway from the summit?
"Juniper Networks is our biggest partner. When Nomios started several years ago, Juniper Networks was our first vendor or only vendor at that time. And so the structure of our company is very much aligned with the structure at Juniper Networks with the service provider market, datacentre and cloud, and then the enterprise market," said Richard Landman, head of marketing, at Dutch cybersecurity and networking partner, Nomios Group.
"We're growing in that segment (enterprise) alongside Juniper and I think the biggest takeaway for us is that, at this point in time, Juniper Networks has the strongest portfolio ever in the enterprise markets.
"In the history of the company there has never been a better time to win in the enterprise segment, especially now that we saw the break of AI with ChatGPT - that went from a marketing hype to a real hype.
"Suddenly people are realising the potential of AI and I think that will be a game changer for Juniper as well because they have been already developing AI for several years. So for us in 2023. Big focus will be on the enterprise market."
What do you think about the Juniper Partner Advantage Programme?
"Nomios has always been a partner at the top level. We were an elite partner for many years. Last year we started with the Elite Plus programme which I think was a real game changer. We invested heavily in marketing campaigns which resulted in tremendous growth.
"The Elite Plus for 2023 is going to be a lot bigger than what we did in 2022. We're going to make really significant investments in marketing. Things in the history of our company that we never did before.
"And we are only doing that because we really are convinced that it is the right moment for Juniper Networks. It's the right moment for Nomios to expand into the enterprise markets."
What do you make of Juniper's strategy and how it affects your business?
"Juniper has a very strong focus on the channel and as a result there's a relationship with a lot of mutual trust.
"We need to do it together. Juniper has its strengths, it has fantastic technology, and a great channel organisation. We have our local sales teams, our experts, our support organisation to build to add value on top of that.
"So what we bring to the market is really a combination of those two things. And I think you can only do that if there's a lot of trust and tight integration between the two organisations to achieve that.
"We're already very strong in the datacentre and cloud service provider markets, but in the enterprise market we are still less known.
"If you compare the big names HPE Aruba and Cisco there's a lot for us to win there. And we really believe that we have a winning solution. Delivering a network as a service powered by AI, if you're an IT manager and you need to refresh your network, you need to refresh your wireless, Juniper and Nomios should be at the top of your list."
Opportunities in AI and growth in the enterprise market: Partners react to Juniper Networks' 2023 partner summit
We hear from three Juniper partners who gave their thoughts following the vendor’s recent event in Madrid
VolkerWessels Telecom
What was your biggest takeaway from the summit?
"I think the biggest takeaway is the collaboration. It doesn't matter where you come from. It doesn't matter what kind of partner you are, it feels like a family," said Arjen Bakker, director of connectivity services and solutions at Norway, Denmark and Sweden-based MSP, VolkerWessels Telecom.
"For me the connection with Juniper is that they understand that technology is not the most important thing, it's how you offer it to customers and end users, because everyone has their own challenges."
What do you think about the Juniper Partner Advantage Programme?
"In our portfolio we use the full stack Juniper solution. We know what the end user wants and what I've seen over the past two days is that Juniper listens to its partners because they understand how important the partners are.
"We see the evolution of JPA as a continued commitment to investing in partners like us."