Channel Focus: All you need to know about IBM's partner program

Founded in 1911 by financier and businessman Charles Ranlett Flint, International Business Machines (IBM) - the Computing Tabulating Recording (CTR) company until 1924 - remains an elder statesman of IT, reporting $61.9 billion revenues for full-year 2023 and maintaining a strong innovation record from AI and quantum computing to industry-specific cloud solutions and patents.

Chair and chief executive Arvind Krishna steers roughly 280,000 employees from its Armonk, New York headquarters. IBM's current vision is trained on AI and data platform Watsonx and hybrid-cloud-focused Red Hat OpenShift in particular - having acquired Red Hat in 2019. 

Key business use cases include code modernization, customer service, and digital labor. Cloud market share in Q3 2024 near level-pegged with Oracle, matching Salesforce, Tencent, and Huawei with 2% of the market.

Although Big Blue won't reveal its partner numbers, estimates have suggested around 55,000 partners, including 12,000 in the US, ranging from NTT Data Business Solutions, Wipro, and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) to MySQL, AgilOne, Cohesive, Insight, Shi International and more.

Key offerings

IBM's latest Watson-lineage platform Watsonx is billed as a productivity, code quality, and customer experience (CX) facilitator, incorporating core AI, data, and governance. 

Its Granite AI large language models aim at high-performance enterprise tasks from cybersecurity to retrieval augmented generation (RAG).  

Meanwhile Red Hat OpenShift, following IBM's acquisition of Red Hat in 2019, targets an estimated two-thirds of organizations struggling to manage complex hybrid and multi-cloud environments - especially as more businesses grapple with genAI in the cloud.

The on-demand enterprise platform IBM Cloud helps build out many solutions. For instance, Watsonx AI and IBM Cloud, complemented by ML, assist complex analyses of population, infrastructure, urbanization, elevation, land use, and satellite data for electricity-access forecasting out to 2030.

Along similar AI and hybrid cloud-focused lines, the "VM as a service" IBM Power Virtual Server was announced at IBM Think 2024 as a platform for workloads including AI and for extending on-premises environments into the cloud.

Recent news: 

• Just before Christmas 2024, IBM announced a tie-up with Lockheed Martin, integrating Granite into its AI Factory tools for aerospace and defense innovation.
• October 2024 saw IBM launch the third version of high-performing Granite LLM AI for enterprise data. 
• In January 2024, Krishna said in an earnings call that its genAI and Watsonx "book of business" had doubled from its Q3  "low hundreds of millions", with demand continuing to rise. 

IBM for partners

Channel chief is Kate Woolley, whose official title is General Manager, IBM Ecosystem. Reportedly, IBM hopes to generate 80% of revenues via its partner ecosystem in three to five years - up from 40% of revenues in 2023 and 15% two years before that. 

In the same IBM Think 2023 interview for Partner Plus day, IBM senior vice president of software and chief commercial officer Rob Thomas suggested it seeks new customers spending $25,000-$50,000, to grow to $250,000 over three or four years post-acquisition.

While Big Blue was initially slow to monetize AI, it's since been targeting the recruitment of hundreds of partners for Watsonx alone. In October, Woolley said it "takes a village" to bridge AI skills and cost gaps. "AI is projected to unlock $16 trillion in value by 2030, generating opportunity for technology providers of all shapes and sizes."

Why partners matter

According to Woolley at TechXChange, its partner-first strategy reflects its recognition that business transformation needs can't be met by vendors alone. "The power of AI technology is only as great as its ability to get into the hands of developers, open-source communities, and business users," she said.

For instance, IBM plans to continue building agent capabilities across its portfolio in 2025, including pre-built agents for specific domains and use cases. 

Introducing the new Partner Plus program Services Track in January 2024, Woolley wrote about the ongoing importance of IBM’s partner-first focus. 

"Consultancies, advisory firms, systems integrators (SIs) and managed services providers (MSPs) are a vital part of the IBM Ecosystem," she said.

Partner programs, tiers, and partner types

IBM Partner Plus replaced PartnerWorld as the linchpin partner program in 2023. With Silver, Gold, and Platinum tiers and a new-partner accelerator program, it has refreshed incentives, co-marketing, and demand generation approaches. 

For instance, meeting Silver criteria, accepting IBM Partner Plus Program Benefits terms, and the Know Your IBM Attachment means they can use the IBM Software Access Catalog, and allow customers to evaluate IBM Software for up to 90 days. 

A Blue designation exists separately for IBM strategic partners -- typically cloud service providers and infrastructure or software vendors such as Cisco or SAP working with both IBM Consulting and IBM Technology solutions. 

Partner Plus has Build, Sell, and Service tracks:

• IBM Build partners - independent software developers (ISVs) and MSPs - integrate and extend IBM technologies. AI and hybrid cloud, unsurprisingly, are foci.
• IBM Sell partners funnel into data and AI, hybrid cloud, automation, sustainability, and storage areas. 
• IBM Service partners - SIs or consultancies - can build practices and Centers of Excellence for IBM technologies.

Further benefits, rewards, and incentives

As usual, a wealth of resources exist, including a partner portal.

• Partner demand generation programs, including the demand engine with marketing kits, joint-marketing support, and access to incremental marketing funds.
• Auto deal share to eligible partners for opportunities of less than $250,000.
• Real-time visibility into earnings and deal eligibility.
• AI deal share engine for lead generation.
• Insider programs, IBM education and training.
• Competitive pricing, deal protection, and special-bid access. 
• Tutorials. For instance for registering cloud services with the IBM Cloud Partner Center.
• Value seller tool for preferred pricing.
• Global technical resources.
• Personalized support via the partner support desk.

IBM offers to answer questions via the partner login. An IBMid is needed to log in to the partner portal - go here to create an account.

How to get on board

You can sign up here to enquire about a partnership. Again, you'll likely need an IBMid to tell the vendor about your organization and how you'd like to partner. 

Once registration is approved, new partners should select an onboarding distributor or tech broker to further guide them through the process. After accepting the terms, IBM emails confirmation of the next steps. New partners are onboarded with the Partner Accelerator for six months, which offers direct assistance, onboarding training, and marketing and sales materials.