Latest / Partnerships Unraveled / 074 - Darren Sharpe of Microsoft - The Benefits of Cloud Marketplaces for Channel Partners

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074 - Darren Sharpe of Microsoft - The Benefits of Cloud Marketplaces for Channel Partners · Partnerships Unraveled

• 0:07
  Speaker 2: Welcome back to Partnerships Unravel, the podcast where we unravel the mysteries about channel and partnerships on a weekly basis.
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: My name is Effa and I'll be your host in this episode.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: I'm excited to announce our special guest, darren.
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: How are you doing, darren?
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: I'm really good.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Thanks, Effo.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Great to be here today.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: Thanks for having me.
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: Thank you for joining.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: So, darren, today we're going to discuss cloud marketplaces specifically Microsoft Azure, obviously and the value they provide to end users, isvs and channel partners.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: Darren, could you please give us an introduction?
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Who are you and what do you do?
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks, effo.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: So my name is Darren Sharp.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: I'm in our UK ISV team in what we call Global Partner Solutions and I'm responsible for our marketplace services partnerships and building out that resell capability with Azure marketplace and our various platforms.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: And also you speak a lot about the value of the cloud marketplaces, the value of the Microsoft Azure, and I've watched some of your other podcast episodes.
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: I watched some of your speeches that you gave, and what I want to start with at the beginning is the value the cloud marketplaces provide to the end users, to the buyers.
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: So things such as shortened time to value cost savings, the ability to draw down on committed spend, et cetera.
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: So, darren, could you share the key reasons why buyers are preferring to buy from cloud marketplaces?
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's a big story because I mean you've touched on some of the top-line use cases there.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: But actually it's the changes in buying modalities that we have as individuals as we have matured in this digital world.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: So line of business buyers are out there buying software that they're standing up, the applications that they need to run their business.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: Actually they're finding that many of these new-to-market digital native software organizations are starting with cloud marketplaces because their VC organizations understand that for that ISV it's a fast time to revenue.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: So many of these apps are cloud-first.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: They're also elastic.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: These organizations don't want to build their own elastic metering and billing solutions and they're relying on cloud marketplaces to deliver that elasticity.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: And then you've got all the benefits around co-selling with the hyperscaler, whether that's Microsoft or AWS or GCP.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: So there's a lot of benefits for the ISV.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: I think those are rapidly coming to the fore now with the customer.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: You mentioned retiring those cloud commits.
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: In a Microsoft world.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: That's the Microsoft Azure consumption commitment and that's super powerful for those big enterprises that are looking to get closer to those cloud discounts by buying software through Azure Marketplace.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: But actually over 40% of cloud marketplace buyers are SMB.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: They're not going to have those cloud commits today and that's prime use cases to where we're seeing some huge acceleration because they're just using the tools they are finding, trying and testing those tools using a cloud marketplace, using an aggregated platform to help them manage their SaaS, their containers, their virtual machines and all the tooling that sits around it.
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: So it's a big story as to why, but I think the headlines are cost-efficient, fast access to tools, increased time to value and actually, as we get into the partner piece, it's managing those enterprise contracts.
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: It becomes rather a buying tool, but it's actually helping ISVs and partners sell to customers.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: The customer is deriving even more value out of managing those enterprise software contracts through the marketplace.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: So big answer, but there's a huge amount of value that customers are seeing and it's in many, many different segments.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that.
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: The reason why I wanted to start with the value that it provides to end users is because I think that is the critical piece.
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: I think if the end user, if they're preferring this method, then the rest of the questions, the value of the marketplaces to ISVs and the channel partners then it becomes a little bit more self-explanatory, I would say.
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, great we recently got accepted to the Microsoft Azure startup program.
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: Yes.
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: I told you in our last chat.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm also excited to be a part of that program.
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: But you mentioned for the enterprise, so the backlogs, the ability to draw down the retire that committed spend, and panelists reported that the three hyper scalers are sitting on tens of billions of dollars of unspent Cloud backlog.
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: So this was data from July 2023, and I'm not sure what the current numbers are, but so therefore, currently many IT vendors and ISVs are rushing to capture a piece of this pie by developing the go-to-market strategies around hyper-scalar marketplaces.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: So what are the other key reasons why we're seeing this hype, this focus on developing go-to-market strategies around hyper-scalers for ISVs?
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: And also, what is your response to the vendors who say that why do I need a Cloud marketplace?
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: I already have a channel.
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a fantastic question.
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: I try not to spend too long on all of this.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: Let's start with that Cloud commit first of all and just debunk that a little bit because, as much as it might be, why I think, as I touched upon, why vendors start in that way, why customers start in that way it's the big headline number is that you can retire those commits regardless of what Cloud you're in, by Cloud marketplace spend, whether that's with or without a partner.
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: But look, we're way beyond that now.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: The hyper-scalers have been doing that for a long time.
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: We've been doing that for a long time in Asia.
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: Yes, those enterprises can have those benefits, but that's absolutely not the being on end.
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: All as we started discussing the huge amounts of value that sit within the platform in terms of controls and governance, all those good things.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: That's where customers are seeing the value.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: Now they are seeing the elastic consumption of their modernizing application portfolio being delivered and managed through a Cloud marketplace.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: That's not just about retiring that Cloud commit, it's all those functional benefits of the platform thereafter.
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: I remember you mentioned governance.
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: I think that's also something that is unique to Microsoft Azure, for example, the segmented users having different levels of control.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: Could you also give us a little bit of information about that?
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: I think again, it's another reason.
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Why isn't it To combine those questions together, really, about why ISV should be working with channel partners when they've already got channel?
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: That's a key reason as well, I think, when people initially started looking at Cloud Marketplaces and bear in mind this is quite a mature market.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: Now We've had Azure Marketplace for close to 10 years.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: Some others have been around a tiny bit longer.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: We're in that mass adoption phase now We've crossed the chasm of those early adopters.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: When we talk about governance and guardrails, it's one of those other reasons why ISVs are building more within Cloud Marketplaces.
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: It's not just Azure specific as much as we do have some really comprehensive security controls based around what we call our back role-based access control.
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: That's governance and management layers within the Azure platform, but actually that integrates really nicely into private marketplace.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: Private marketplace is that simple workflow that matches into the role-based access control that can give the procurement persona some of that control back.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: Let's map back into that question as to what the ISVs are doing.
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: Much of this is about line of business buying.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: I think there was a Zylo survey going back probably to 2019 now with some surprising numbers that called out that the average enterprise can have up to 600 or maybe more SaaS applications.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: That's a huge number.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: I still ask that question today when I meet with audiences what number of SaaS applications do you think the average enterprise is using today?
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: That number is still surprising.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: People start in the low hundreds sometimes, but that was ratified four years ago.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: 70 percent of that and again this is in the latest Zylo SaaS index survey as well 70 percent of that is consumed in the line of business.
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: Those buyers are standing up products that they need to run a business and the procurement persona needs to.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: We don't like the word controls, but we don't want to stifle innovation, but they need to put some guardrails around who's doing what.
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: That's where that private marketplace, that governance piece, comes into the platform, because as customers look to buy rather than build, our ISVs, our independent software vendors, are absolutely still building on the platform because they're using our AI tools and they've got to be in the cloud if they want to build those AI tools into their products and our customers using the platform to consume, to enterprise, contract and manage and then to put some governance around.
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: And to answer that question again, because I think that's a really great one about why do I need a cloud marketplace and a cloud marketplace channel when I've already got a channel?
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: Well, if you've already got a channel, mr ISV, I would challenge you that do you have a channel community that is delivering that cost optimization in a really modern way and that's using cloud marketplaces as your marketplace, for example, as that mechanism of transformation?
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: And that's going to help maybe a very traditional ISV that's already got a channel.
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: It's going to help that traditional ISV access a new buying persona.
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: It's going to help them have a cost optimization talk track in the cloud to some very savvy sellers at a channel partner.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: That's extended reach.
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: Those sellers want to know who's in the club of delivering in this very cost efficient way.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: Who's delivering this annuity style business, this consumption business that's right for a customer and that's the difference.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: It's not just turning on the same old channel.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: This is about delivering with channel partners that are delivering these services that are very often becoming visible to their customers, and it's doing it in this modern, elastic way with cloud marketplaces.
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that and I'm going to get back to how to incorporate the channel with a cloud marketplace strategy.
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: But before we dive into that, there's a point that I want to touch upon, and that is so, as an ISV, how do you develop a strategy around the cloud marketplace?
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: So I think, like any partner, let's go to market strategy.
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: So partnering with cloud marketplaces could really backfire if the whole organization is not aligned with that motion.
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: And there are some ISVs that are really mature in this process, but maybe there are some ISVs that are just starting out.
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: So if you were a partnership leader at an ISV, how would you communicate the value of the cloud marketplaces internally and how would you get that executive alignment?
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: So we've got some good things to come here in terms of a cloud marketplace practice build framework, and this is both for ISVs and channel partners, because I feel you hit some really solid points here.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: There's certainly some potentially some fear and certainty and doubt as to how to build this, whether you're a digital native or whether you are very traditional ISV organization, and it's a big story as to how to get this right.
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: But there's some very simple tactical areas that we need to make sure are covered.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: One of that is finance.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: For sure, we need to make sure that, regardless of your route to market, there is at least neutrality for your sellers, and I think that's a common mistake Not only needs to be cost neutral based on route to market, it also needs to be simple and visible.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: So having a single source of truth internally is to what the process looks like to get your product to your customer through a cloud marketplace and a channel partner or through a traditional route, whatever that may be.
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: That needs to be clearly visible within the organization and it needs to be not necessarily understood by everybody, because not everybody's going to understand this.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: This is next generation thinking.
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: It's that new route to market where people have transacted in a very traditional way for many, many years.
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: So transparency is key.
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: Your seller community is key.
• 14:10
  Speaker 1: Building cloud marketplaces into your sales strategy If you, as an ISV, are using a MediCorps or Medpix style sales methodology, then actually making sure that cloud marketplaces are assessed and managed as part of the economic buyer identification is really key to how you go to market.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: If things are neutral, if it's cost neutral, then customer and partner will make the right decision.
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: They'll make the decision that's going to be best fit for them.
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: What we don't want to be doing is driving internal competition and complexity.
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: That then ends up at the customer because that slows down those sales cycles.
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: It means that we're not executing on that fast time to value and we'll get onto the constructs in a minute of what the marketplaces look like.
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: But actually the whole premise of this is super efficiency.
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: If you think about a private offer process, which is that custom terms, custom price and a custom EULA, an ISV can now issue an offer via a partner into a customer Because the offer is because the product is automated, it's SaaS or it's containers or there's some kind of API integration into the hyper scaler.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: Think about it.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: We can get that commercial terms and that product into that customer really, really quickly.
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: That's super powerful.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: Lots of business transformation to consider, but the key is transparency.
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: We understand that cloud marketplaces aren't going to fit every scenario but in an automated software delivery, understanding the business process change that you, as an ISV, need to go through, we can absolutely help you with that.
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: As we've discussed, we're going to do some work on bringing this cloud marketplace practice builder to those ISVs and to those channel partners over the next coming weeks and months.
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: I love that you said that not everyone currently understands this and not everyone is supposed to understand, but I think that's not going to be the story.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: In a few years, I think this is going to be the go to way to buy, procure and test software and cloud applications.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: So I think that I think we've crossed the chasm, but I think that there's a lot of way to go, I agree.
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: So one of the challenges ISVs with established channels are having is managing conflict with their existing channel partners.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: So how can ISVs incorporate their channel partners into their hyperscaler cloud marketplace strategies instead of being in competition with them?
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: And also, could you please tell us a little bit about how is Microsoft helping ISVs incorporate their channel partners into this motion?
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: It's a great question and it's an evolving space because for many people, you know, channel it does absolutely include the value that happens at the distribution layer within that channel community.
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: And I think the answer here is just to be open and honest about your route to market and how you're driving net new incremental business together with that software partner, with that ISV.
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: Because if a channel partner is going to market with you know, with a particular product or solution portfolio, you know that channel partner is adding some value around with their own services, with their own trusted advice, you know, helping a customer understand the ecosystem of ISVs that are interconnected and have got some product adjacencies and as much as that go to market might be marketplace led, you know, for that particular go to market motion actually there's going to be many instances where you know a traditional premise type architecture is going to be employed and the product is going to be consumed that way.
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: So the point is, if a channel partner is going to market with that solution, there shouldn't be necessarily the fear that everything is going to go down one particular transaction route.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: The point is there's more to be gained by driving the right customer outcome and letting the customer and the partner jointly work on what that consumption route is, and that's an evolution.
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: You know we're trying not to drive the compete in that world, because it's about driving that right customer outcome.
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: I mean how Microsoft are solving this.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: We're about to launch in the UK this multi-party private offer approach, or MPO, because we all need some more acronyms, don't we?
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: So that multi-party approach is allowing an ISV to authorize a channel partner and hey, that's you know in Microsoft, the largest channel community in the world, something like 90,000 partners provided that selling partner is enrolled in the Microsoft AI Cloud Partnership Program and is a registered publisher in Marketplace.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: Those are the only two prerequisites.
• 19:26
  Speaker 1: An ISV will be able to issuer an offer into that selling partner and push the offer onto a customer and still retire those max.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: Now, being transparent, I think that's you know.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: That's a one tier approach to that agent accounting process.
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: We're looking at how we can bring about a two tier MPO and include that very valuable distribution channel in that flow of transactions.
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: So where ISVs need that value and that extended reach into their long tail resale community, and they're doing that via a well known distributor.
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: They will absolutely be able to do that in coming months and that's in pilot with our US team currently.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: So MPO is available in the US today.
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: We launch MPO in preview in the UK in early May this year with about 25 partners and then we get to general availability in July.
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: So absolutely, the channel is critical to the way we're going to market and a little bit of inside track.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: I'll give this one to you because I think this is super insightful.
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: Within Microsoft those multi-party private offer transactions are typically three times larger than a standard private offer transaction.
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: As much as Canalis saw, that predicted that at least 30% of this private offer business will be transacting through channel.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Actually, if you look at the latest tackleio state of cloud marketplaces papers, you know that survey that they did across thousands of respondents back in November.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: 63% of respondents in from that survey had channel involved in their private offer transactions.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: So the direction of travel here is the value that is born about through working with a selling partner, not necessarily that direct private offer transaction, but all are available.
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: You know the Microsoft partner first approach is absolutely about bringing value and bringing to life that channel partner construct.
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's a very impressive number and I think it connects very well with my next question as well.
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: I think, as we see the hyperscaler, the cloud marketplaces becoming more popular, so it brought a level of worry to the channel partner and the distributor community.
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: So there was this thought that the customers can somehow bypass the partners by buying directly from the marketplaces.
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: But in reality, as you said, that buyers still need the channel partners to help them discover, procure, deploy, integrate and manage solutions all the services they wrap around that solution.
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: And, as you said, that I think it was over 60% that there was still a channel partner involved in a purchase through the cloud marketplace.
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: And I think you also developed some frameworks or templates for the partners and ISVs to be successful at working with Microsoft Azure.
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: If you have that ready, we will put that in the link.
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: Can we share that with our audience?
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, we can absolutely share that.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: You know very excited to let people know what that looks like.
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: But that kind of practice build a framework or marketplace readiness is available for both channel partners and for ISVs that are looking to work through the operational, the finance, the program.
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: The GTM needs that they'll need to do to get that baseline of marketplace success.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that.
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: So for our audience for listening, I will make sure to put links to those documents in the description.
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: But maybe, before we wrap this up, my final question is could you elaborate a little bit more about the value the cloud marketplaces bring to the channel partners?
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: Again, it's many and far reaching and I think you know we've got some really mature cloud marketplace partners now that are driving incremental profitability.
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: And so let's start there with the numbers, because that's the most important thing, if I think, for those channel partners and I've had many partners over the years talk to me about how this is driven that incremental profitability and the reason why is it's access to a whole world of new and potentially ISVs that don't necessarily have that channel motion.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: First and foremost had one particular big UK partner that talked to me about they'd actually landed $20 million worth of new software business that they would not have seen had they not partnered with one of those other hyperscalar cloud marketplaces in the first six months.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: So the value in the part for the partner there was access to a whole world of new software solutions that they could deliver to their customers that didn't necessarily fit within their existing vendor alliances team.
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: Now we've also got a whole load of efficiencies there with the process and, if we look at this agent accounting process that all the cloud marketplaces employ, the fact that the hyperscaler Microsoft in our case is being the billing management here.
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: You know, in many cases where this is a customer private offer.
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: The mechanism of retiring those Macs, those Microsoft Azure consumption commitments, is that Microsoft is doing all the billing and invoicing and actually as much as that won't necessarily in most cases give the partner access to the revenue.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: It's a very cost efficient process because all we're doing is we're adding the software onto the customer's cloud bill.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Now that's if there is a Mac decorator in place, that's helping the channel partner and the ISV together maybe shorten that sales cycle, maybe make that deal a little bit bigger because there's potentially more budget available because we're retiring that Mac but actually Microsoft handling all that billing, that invoicing, that credit aggregation, that cost of cash, that's a super important value to the partner because it's increasing their bottom line profitability.
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: You think about 100% of the margin that they put on that private offer transaction.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: That multi-party private offer can be attributed to 100% margin if there is no revenue attached to that.
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: So that is increasing that profit mix.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: So for those partners that are looking at EBITDA and profitability, that's an incredible value.
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: And then we get into the real efficiencies of the process because customers financially contracted to Microsoft through their Microsoft customer agreement but actually terms of use are delivered from the ISV.
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: That end user license agreement is from the ISV, or maybe a standard contract, maybe a standard Microsoft contract within the Microsoft publisher agreement.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: So there are some efficiencies there for the procurement persona.
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: So the point I'm trying to get to and this is a much bigger story, we can talk about a much bigger pitch but it's access to a new software portfolio, a modernizing application portfolio that's delivered elastically.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: It's a new profitability stream and actually, for those channel partners that are really building out these cloud marketplace practices, it's about delivering this modernizing application portfolio and that becomes sticky and repeatable.
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: It's the modern way of delivering those cost optimization services that channel partners have delivered so well for many, many years and that have potentially become invisible.
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: They're the partner that has got the customer intimacy, the customer reach and the depth of customer understanding.
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: They're the trusted advisor.
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: So it's about that.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: It's about a partner delivering those ecosystems and adjacencies.
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: As we've said, how do we build a highly efficient, adjacent not over licensed, not over subscribed application specific environment for the customer to go and modernize and innovate?
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: Some big words in there, but there's some super value in here and a big talk track that hopefully we can deliver when we can dive into a bit deeper, when we talk again next time.
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: I would love that, especially that MPO piece.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: It sounds very interesting.
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: Maybe in the future, once you launch that, maybe we could catch up again.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: I would love to do that.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: Let's have that conversation and talk about the value that we're about to bring to our partners, Not only in the UK.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: We launched the UK and Canada in preview in May and then we roll out into Amir after that later on this year.
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: So, yeah, there's lots of exciting channel transformation to be delivered to those longstanding and those new Microsoft partners that may be new to Microsoft.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: This is all about driving that customer intimacy and supporting that buy versus build approach that we know our customers want to go through.
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think this is also very interesting for what we do at ChenEx and our audience as well, so that would definitely be a valuable piece for our audience.
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: So there, and before I let you go, we always like to ask our guests to invite the next guest on the podcast.
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: Who do you think we should have next?
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a great question and there's a number of really good candidates.
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: I would nominate a fantastic colleague of mine who is in our category lead team.
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: He actually leads our security category market base, which is one of the largest categories, as we know, in all cloud market bases, very well connected in that space.
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: It's a gentleman called Jeff Cornwall.
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: Jeff's a fantastic presenter and leads a lot of those partnerships with, well, some of the world's largest security software organizations.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: So Jeff will be, I think, a fantastic guest to come and, you know, give a bit of a deeper dive into how some of those security infrastructure plays.
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: Are, you know, driving those great customer outcomes through marketplaces?
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: I think, for your suggestion.
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: We will definitely reach out to Jeff.
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: Jeff, if you're listening, yes, I would love to have you on our podcast.
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: Well, thank you, darren, let's wrap this podcast, and thank you for joining us today and sharing your expertise on the cloud market places.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: Thanks for some great questions, FA.
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: Look forward to talking to you next time.