Five Companies That Came To Win This Week
For the week ending March 28, CRN takes a look at the companies that brought their ‘A’ game to the channel including CrowdStrike, Omnissa, LevelBlue, Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise, Celona and Microsoft.
The Week Ending March 28
Topping this week’s Five Companies that Came to Win is cybersecurity superstar CrowdStrike for launching a significant channel program expansion to boost its Falcon Next-Gen SIEM offering.
Launching new partner programs was big this week as both VMware spin-out Omnissa and AT&T spin-out LevelBlue make the list for rolling out new partner programs.
Networking provider Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise and private wireless provider Celona are here for teaming up to combine their networking and 5G wireless technologies, respectively, to create new connectivity options for partners and customers.
And Microsoft makes the list for debuting a first set of AI agents for its Security Copilot platform, beginning the next phase of the tech giant’s effort to bring greater automation to overburdened security teams.
CrowdStrike Debuts Services Partner Program In Significant Move To Accelerate Next-Gen SIEM
CrowdStrike announced a major channel expansion this week as the cybersecurity giant unveiled its new Services Partner Program, through which the company will rely on partners to predominantly deliver services around its fast-growing Falcon Next-Gen SIEM offering.
The company is taking a “partner-first approach on services” for Next-Gen SIEM with the program, in a move to more heavily depend on the channel for services ranging from consulting and implementation to managed services around SIEM, said Daniel Bernard, CrowdStrike chief business officer.
“It’s a big cultural change for CrowdStrike, in terms of embracing and inviting and bringing partners into services,” Bernard said. “What we’re really doing is evolving how we work with this audience and working with them in a new way for the first time. It’s a huge cultural move for us.”
In an interview with CRN, CrowdStrike co-founder and CEO George Kurtz said the company is depending on partners to help make Next-Gen SIEM a reality for customers.
“With Next-Gen SIEM, you really need a consultative approach to think about how to transform into an AI-powered [Security Operations Center], as opposed to a legacy SOC,” Kurtz said.
CrowdStrike’s new Services Partner Program will focus on global system integrator partners as well as MSP and MSSP partners. The program will include new incentives and training as well as tools and support from the cybersecurity vendor, according to the company.
VMware Spin-Out Omnissa Launches New Partner Program
Omnissa, the spin-out of VMware’s end-user computing business, wins a round of applause this week for introducing a new partner program as it prepares for battle in a hot virtualization market with customers exploring a variety of alternative vendors with their solution providers.
Solution providers that work with Omnissa should see a faster, more lucrative partner program than before as the company moves nearly 100 percent of its services business to the channel, said Kevin Norlin, Omnissa senior vice president of global sales and head of revenue.
Omnissa became independent of VMware and VMware parent Broadcom in July 2024 after investment firm giant KKR bought the business for about $4 billion. The vendor is leaning on partners at this time to help with a better focus on projects over products, Norlin said.
The new partner program features a three-tier system for Platinum, Gold and Silver partnerships. The program also accommodates three business models—reseller, service provider and technology partners.
Partners receive front-end margin increases, joint account team access, training funds and other incentives and benefits, according to Omnissa. Training and certifications for Omnissa’s Workspace One and Horizon are available and tailored to different partner business models.
The program has a performance-based progression framework and a points-based rewards system for accomplishments across transactions and service delivery. A dashboard with real-time program performance insight is “coming soon,” according to the company.
AT&T Cybersecurity Spin-Off LevelBlue Debuts New Program To Transform Partners Into MSSPs
And completing a trifecta of partner program launches this week, LevelBlue wins kudos for rolling out a new partner program for MSSPs, or those on the journey toward becoming an MSSP.
In May AT&T Cybersecurity spun off LevelBlue as a standalone managed cybersecurity services business. Now the provider is ready to launch its new portal, security services, and marketing and partner enablement materials for new and existing partners, Sundhar Annamalai, president of LevelBlue, told CRN.
LevelBlue today offers global managed security services, cybersecurity consulting, threat intelligence and security operations center (SOC) support. The company offers a suite of easy to integrate, scalable security services in a flexible consumption-based model for managed and unmanaged cybersecurity services, according to the company.
The new program will arm MSPs with the resources they need to become MSSPs, said Annamalai.
The new LevelBlue partner program includes its full portfolio of services, including LevelBlue USM Anywhere, the company’s security monitoring offering for premises-based, cloud, or hybrid environments. It also covers LevelBlue Managed Threat Detection and Response, LevelBlue Managed Vulnerability Scanning, the LevelBlue Penetration Testing Service and LevelBlue Incident Response Retainer.
LevelBlue’s new partner program has three tiers, and existing partners will roll into one of the three tiers, Annamalai said. LevelBlue will also offer in-depth training and dedicated support for partners, according to the Plano, Texas-based company.
The aim of the program is to offer a simplified approach to cybersecurity with scalable services from both LevelBlue, as well as third-party security players, Annamalai said.
Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise Teams With Private Cellular Standout Celona For Integrated Networking, Private 5G
Networking provider Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise (ALE) and private wireless provider Celona make this week’s list for teaming up to extend ALE’s LAN and WLAN portfolio to include enterprise-grade 5G service, the two companies said this week.
Connecting people and devices is a big area of focus right now for ALE. The partnership with Celona will help fill in the connectivity gaps for environments such as manufacturing facilities, refineries, warehouses, and airport areas to support IoT use cases, the companies said.
“This partnership with Celona helps us to expand our connectivity options, because we’re not only able to just do Wi-Fi and wired technology, but also cellular,” said Charles Matthews, senior vice president of strategy for ALE.
It represents a “big offering” for ALE partners too, who have primarily viewed 5G as a telco offering, Matthews said.
“Where Wi-Fi isn’t the right wireless technology, [partners] will be able to include 5G for end-to-end connectivity. Including 5G for enterprises is still relatively new, at least for our partners, and the solution is completely interconnected with Celona, so we think there’s a lot of opportunities for our partners here,” he said.
Celona and ALE together can help partners and their end customers handle IT/OT convergence holistically, Rajeev Shah, Celona co-founder and CEO, told CRN. The two companies are now offering solutions that have been integration-tested, rather than simply a resale agreement of Celona’s technology through ALE partners.
The companies will integrate ALE’s OmniVista for network management, OmniSwitch portfolio for access, core, data center and industrial LAN and OmniAccess Stellar Wi-Fi 6, 6E and 7 networking portfolios, with Celona’s private 5G technology. Celona’s technology includes Zero Trust Network Access, SIM authentication and the company’s patented MicroSlicing and Aerloc security technologies for application-level SLAs and policy enforcement, the company said.
Microsoft Debuts Security Copilot Agents
Microsoft looked to strengthen its competitive hand in the security arena this week, announcing a first set of AI agents for its Security Copilot platform, beginning the next phase of the tech giant’s effort to bring greater automation to overburdened security teams.
Dorothy Li, corporate vice president for Microsoft Security Copilot, said the launch of the six agentic offerings is aimed at “really taking automation to that next step” for security teams.
The move comes a year after Microsoft released its Security Copilot platform into general availability — and at a time when interest in AI agents continues to surge as a potential next frontier for LLM technology.
The agentic expansion for Security Copilot will have an impact across Microsoft’s full security portfolio — consisting of threat protection (Defender and Sentinel), data governance and compliance (Purview), identity and access management (Entra) and device management (Intune).
