Emulex Enhances Connect Partner Program

Channel Program Improvements Reward Reseller Loyalty and Maximize Partner Profitability

COSTA MESA, Calif. – Emulex Corporation (NYSE:ELX), the leader in network connectivity, monitoring and management, today announced significant enhancements to its Connect Partner Program™, including a new loyalty program, enhanced reseller training tools, and streamlined deal registration and web enablement. The Connect Partner Program will also be extended to Emulex reseller partners in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region in 2013. The Emulex Connect Partner Program arms resellers with the tools, training, and incentives to drive best-of-breed I/O technologies and joint solutions into the channel, enabling the highest-performing data centers across the globe.

“The next generation of our Connect Partner Program is designed to maximize partner profits and revenues, while helping them bring high-performing Fibre Channel and network convergence solutions to the market, enabling customers’ leading-edge applications such as big data, software defined networking, I/O caching and server virtualization deployments worldwide,” said Shaun Walsh, senior vice president of marketing and corporate development, Emulex. “We’ve done this by giving partners faster access to cash incentives, extending some top tier benefits to smaller loyal resellers, and expanding our lead generation efforts for the channel, based on their direct feedback. Additionally, this year, we’re extending all of these benefits to our partners in the APAC region.”

Emulex’s three-tiered partner community, which has been designated for the third straight year as one of CRN Magazine’s 5-Star Partner Programs (see accompanying release here), provides partners with the tools, training, support and information required to promote and sell network and storage connectivity solutions. New enhancements and benefits of the Connect Partner Program include:

• New Loyalty Program: This program provides a path for resellers in the lower program tiers to earn limited Platinum-level benefits by displaying consistent purchase behaviors. Examples of these benefits include demonstration and proof of concept equipment, priority lead distribution, and priority access to Market Development Funds (MDF).
• Enhanced Reseller Incentives: Unlike competing partner programs, all Connect Partners, regardless of tier, now receive complete sales cycle incentives, including project registration, deal registration and SPIFs. Emulex also offers the broadest range of Emulex reward SPIFs, including both Emulex-branded and OEM-branded I/O connectivity solutions.
• Lead and Demand Generation: The Connect Partner Program now includes enhanced Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools, allowing Emulex to provide qualified leads to Connect+ and Platinum tier partners. This is in response to feedback that leads are the top priority for partners’ participation in vendor channel programs, according to the CRN Annual Reseller Survey. 
• Enhanced Reseller Training and Sales Tools: The Emulex Connect Partner Program online training now includes content for all Emulex solutions, including LightPulse® 16Gb Fibre Channel (16GFC) Host Bus Adapters (HBAs), OneConnect® Network Acceleration™ (NX) solutions and OneCommand® Vision. Training was the second highest priority for partners’ participation in vendor channel programs, based on the CRN Annual Reseller Survey.
• Streamlined Enablement and Administrative Tools: Emulex has rolled out a new Salesforce.com-based portal for streamlined deal registration and SPIF claims, which also reduces administrative cycles for resellers.
• Expansion into APAC: Emulex is expanding the reach of the Connect Partner Program by offering Connect benefits to eligible APAC partners in 2013.  This now provides APAC resellers access to the lucrative deal registration and Connect Rewards SPIF programs as well access to a wide range of training and business development tools.

“The loyalty program was a compelling reason for us to join the Connect Partner Program, in addition to the revenue incentives, lead generation and competitive pricing, which will enable us to maximize our profits,” said Gary Johnston, president, IT Partners. “The onboard process for new members is clear and streamlined, and we have been very pleased with interoperability testing, as well as the process to get up-to-speed quickly on the market and key selling points for customers’ next-generation data centers.”

“The Emulex Connect Partner Program is different than other programs as it provides incentives to all of its partners, no matter what tier they fall into, along with a broad range of rewards and promotions to benefit both partner and end user,” said Gordon Esslemont, commercial director of Ultima Business Solutions. “And, with such a broad range of I/O connectivity solutions for our customers, we feel we have the right solution for virtually any customers’ deployment needs, from flash to virtualization, to the cloud.”

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About Emulex

Emulex, the leader in network connectivity, monitoring and management, provides hardware and software solutions for global networks that support enterprise, cloud, government and telecommunications. Emulex’s products enable unrivaled end-to-end application visibility, optimization and acceleration. The Company's I/O connectivity offerings, including its line of ultra high-performance Ethernet and Fibre Channel-based connectivity products, have been designed into server and storage solutions from leading OEMs, including Cisco, Dell, EMC, Fujitsu, Hitachi, HP, Huawei, IBM, NetApp and Oracle, and can be found in the data centers of nearly all of the Fortune 1000. Emulex’s monitoring and management solutions, including its portfolio of network visibility and recording products, provide organizations with complete network performance management at speeds up to 100Gb Ethernet. Emulex is headquartered in Costa Mesa, Calif., and has offices and research facilities in North America, Asia and Europe. For more information about Emulex (NYSE:ELX) please visit http://www.Emulex.com.

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