Roy Schestowitz wrote:
This guy won't get Novell out of the hole.
Depending what you define the "hole" to be. NetWare sales will continue to
plummet, quite naturally so. It's a matter of how good a rebound you can get
owing to SLED. The Linux sales are growing by about 30% per annum, if I
recall correctly. While it's not sufficient perhaps, it sure demonstrates
the growth and adoption of SUSE Linux.
How long ago was it that Novell had 0% Linux sales? So what does a 30% per
annum growth mean? And Hovsepian's own figure is 20%. Might as well be ~ 15%.
CRN: Why has Novell had such a hard time pushing its Linux products and
how do you intend to improve that?
Hovsepian: In reality, we have actually done a good job. We have grown 20
percent.
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All Hovsepian talks about is *partners*. Novell's growth is supposed to
come from "*partners*". Let's see how many time the word is repeated:
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The focus has to be on our markets and our customer segments and how we go
to market, leveraging our *partners* and what we need to get done with our
key *partners* inside the marketplace.
[Second is] continue to really push our agenda towards our *partners*
because they are the key to our success in the long run.
That makes it really hard or complex for our *partners* to simplistically
come into our company, do business and then move through selling our products.
The key for us to be successful is to go through *partners*.
The *partners* have much greater reach.
So the heart and soul of this company goes through our *partners*. When 73
percent of your revenue flows through your *partners*, that is your heart
and soul. Now what we have to do is get more leverage out of that for
ourselves and for our *partners* in the relationship. I think there are
things that we are working on and have done like the most recent Linux
rebate program, as an example, is a good *partners*hip approach that we
have taken.
So for instance right now our *partners* have readily available access to
Novell certified engineering education
One of the things that we are trying to do in the way of simplifying our
business with specific *partners* is having them declare their skills and
value in areas they want to participate in
one of the things that came out of those partner exchanges was that
*partners* would really like to have some investment knowledge to help
them go build Linux practices because they see that as a really important
area that Novell is leading.
You have talked to Jack yourself over the years on *partners*. I will
speak for what I see in the future for us around the *partners*. As I
said, 73 percent of the revenue touches *partners* inside this company.
And the facts are that we will leverage more *partners* going into next
year for more of our revenue. That is the bottom line for where this
company is going.
As Steve appropriately pointed out we have got more of a specialization
for what our *partners* want to do with their businesses.
So to your point, in some of the more mature markets we will work closely
with key *partners* to develop broader and deeper relationships.
The part where I think there is a clear opportunity for improvement is to
make sure we grow faster and take more market share, from my point of
view, with and through our *partners*. What we need to do there are the
things that Steve just highlighted and our rebate program to make sure
that we are enabling our *partners* to be more successful with the sale of
our products.
So for an example we were very partner driven on developing our Open
Workgroup suite. In terms of the Open Workgroup suite that came from three
*partners* over in Europe.
So it is actually a really solid story from my point of view as to what
our *partners* can do and the role they play in helping us be successful
in driving the overall business.
In that area, what I would highlight is a very simple relationship that
would be great for you to help communicate to our *partners*.
Our *partners* need that to help those customers.
We are just seeing real great uptick in that particular product, great
services opportunities for our *partners*.
As you know a number of *partners* have a foot in every camp, and that is
good for their business. And I appreciate that. What I can say is that the
number of *partners* that we have seen grow for ourselves has been
excellent on the Linux side.
So we are seeing good numbers, good growth, good retention of our key
*partners*.
When you stop and think about a Microsoft partner, their average wage rate
is probably down in the $35 to $45 per hour range, and that is going in
the wrong direction for most of the *partners*.
(I would think this si quite OK...)
As we all know the *partners* have made their best money when their has
been sea changes in the marketplace. And Linux and open source with Novell
is a real big sea change.
(It might bring in more money... but at a lower, not higher, hourly rate.
Otherwise, companies switch to Microsoft easy solutions which, at first
glance, seem to necessitate less man/hours.)
We are going to let our *partners* and customers migrate at their own rate
and pace.
We are thankful to the *partners* that have helped us with those migrations.
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That's 33 times in a single interview! Hovsep is selling boxed solutions
that his pushers sell:
"Additionally we are packaging the products to make sure that they meet
what the customer wants in terms of the full enterprise needs."
It's the good old NetWare way of doing things: we produce the box, you
push the box. I wonder if he's ever heard that Debian has 13 CDs free to
download. Even Red Hat counts more on companies coming to its services for
their recognized quality that on some kind of partners-pushers to sell them.
This won't work. No way.
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