Key Announcements Inspire 2023 // Focus on Switzerland

 

 

 

Dear Partners

 

After all the announcements at Inspire, we wanted to share with you the topics that we feel are most important for our ecosystem in Switzerland. You might have read Nicole Dezen’s Blog – however we wanted to double down on a couple of things:

 

1. Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program - fueling partner growth and profitability in the era of AI:

 

In short:

• Microsoft continues to invest and evolve while taking account of your feedback
• MCPP It is now called the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program to better reflect the infusion of AI technologies across our portfolio.   
• The program structure doesn't change: All Solutions Partner designations and specializations remain available. The scoring system, program benefits, badges do not change.
• The program integrates partner lifecycle aspects like onboarding, skilling, GTM, incentives, and co-selling, providing all previous benefits with additional AI-specific offerings without requiring any action from existing partners.
• We introduced three new specializations around AI application development, Business Intelligence and Intelligent Automation. 
• We also made significant investments in the Azure Migrate and Modernize incentive program and announced new Azure Innovate offerings, focusing on AI and analytics.
• We’re launching key marketing resources, including the new “Era of AI” marketing campaign in a box.
• Finally, we also announced the General Availability of the ISV success program, to help ISVs to build and publish applications in the Marketplace

More about the Partner Program: https://assetsprod.microsoft.com/microsoft-ai-cloud-partner-program-faq.pdf
More about the product announcements: Microsoft Inspire: Accelerating AI transformation through partnership - The Official Microsoft Blog

 

2. The future of security with AI: Partner resources to support the customer journey

 

Besides announcements around Bing Chat Enterprise, Microsoft 365 Copilot, new AI capabilities across M365, AI Powered Process Mining in Power Automate or Meta Llama 2 models being available on Azure AI, we’d like to emphasizes the significance of specialized cybersecurity expertise through partners. To address the pressing challenges and deploy end-to-end security solutions for the era of AI, Microsoft has introduced new ways to engage with Microsoft Security Copilot.

• The Microsoft Security Copilot partner engagement offers partners opportunities to develop solutions and services powered by Security Copilot, and interested partners can register for future communications and potential inclusion in our partner design advisory council.
• Starting this fall, Microsoft will expand the accessibility of Security Copilot through the Early Access Program, following its initial private preview announcement in March.

More: blog post by Vasu Jakkal and Alym Rayani

 

3. Microsoft Customer Engagement Methodology (MCEM)

 

MCEM connects Microsoft Sales, Support, Industry Solutions Delivery, and partners across the five sales stages, so we can deliver more value for customers together.

 

The 5 MCEM stages are:

• Start by listening to the customer, understanding what they are truly seeking to drive 
• Inspire & design – with our products and solutions 
• We’ll work with you to empower and achieve what they, the customer wants 
• Together with realise the value 
• We never stop the management and optimisation – while continuing to listen and understand how our collective customer wants to develop their business. 

More: Microsoft Cloud Partner Program by solution areas

 

4. Incentives & Offers

 

There was a significant announcement regarding AI offerings/investments:

• Azure Migrate and Modernize – increasing by 300%
• Azure Innovate (evolution from AMMP) - $100M investment globally

More: Azure Migrate & Modernize and Azure Innovate (microsoft.com)

 

5. Commercial Marketplace

 

It’s the year of the marketplace. Microsoft is making a series of strategic investments into marketplace that will unlock Azure IP co-sell benefits. There is a multi year roadmap – including multi-partner offer / Azure IP co-sell benefits and changes to criteria to eligible azure solutions. These changes will help partners to expand into new sales channels and they are going to unlock sales growth by helping customers to maximize their committed cloud investments.

 

More: Increase customer reach with new investments in the marketplace - Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program

 

6. Inspire & POTYA Switzerland

 

We had the incredible opportunity to honour some of the most innovative and dedicated partners in our ecosystem at our Swiss Inspire 2023 with our local Swiss Partner of the Year Awards. The events in Lausanne and Zurich were filled with inspiring discussions, insightful presentations, and a true sense of community. Thank you for joining and celebrating the local Partner of the Year Awards. Congratulations again to all Award Winners! You can find a summary of all announcements here: Microsoft Inspire 2023 - Microsoft Switzerland News Center.

 

Call to Action:

 

Finally, we would like to invite you to take on the following actions to increase your business potential by leveraging the latest offering Microsoft has launched for its partners.

 

• Make the most of your partnership. Whether you’re building your first app, developing complex integrations, or exploring new services offerings, we offer opportunities to innovate, scale, and differentiate your business:  https://partner.microsoft.com/partnership/maximize-your-partnership.
• Watch Microsoft Inspire sessions live and on demand and browse the session catalog to explore all the available learning opportunities: https://inspire.microsoft.com.
• Build your technical skills. Access role-specific learning paths and build your skills on Microsoft products and solutions. Discover your path: https://partner.microsoft.com/training/training-center.  
• Achieve more with the commercial marketplace. Increase leads and grow revenue by publishing and selling your solutions in the commercial marketplace online catalog. Find out how: https://partner.microsoft.com/solutions/the-commercial-marketplace.  
• Sell with Microsoft. Create a winning sales strategy, scale your reach to global customers, and prepare for co-selling with Microsoft sellers: https://partner.microsoft.com/partnership/sell-with-microsoft.
• Join the partner community. Connect with partners, find out about upcoming events, and crowdsource solutions: https://www.microsoftpartnercommunity.com/
• Join ISV Success. https://www.microsoft.com/isv.

Thank you!

Your Swiss Partner Team