Meru Seeking New Partners With Launch Of XPress Cloud

Wireless infrastructure vendor Meru Networks is seeking to grow its channel partners through the launch of its new controller-less 802.11 ac Wi-Fi solution on Tuesday, Meru XPress Cloud, which is geared directly toward small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs).

XPress Cloud features cloud-based management that is purpose-built for SMEs and distributed enterprises. The portfolio includes a new XP8i access point with management software hosted by Meru, while only network management traffic traverses the cloud in order for all corporate data to remain behind the firewall.

"This is intended to open up a whole, new market for Meru and not only its existing partners, but potentially new partners in the sense that we can take this down market and go after that SME space where IT resources are much more limited," said Don Trimble, vice president of SME cloud sales for Meru, which touts itself as a leader in intelligent Wi-Fi networking.

[Related: Meru Networks Launches SDN App Store, Management Platform]

XPress features management portal customization, enabling a partner-branded offering. The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based vendor gives customers two options for the acquisition of XPress, with XP8i access points available for purchase up front or on a Wi-Fi-as-a-Service (WaaS) subscription basis.

Chris Green, director of technology at Houston-based Bema Information Technologies and Meru partner, said WaaS is going to open the doors to displacing consumer-grade equipment that fails to meet business requirements.

"There's a lot of different ways a partner can make money off this, including an outright resell of the product itself -- there's very good margins," said Trimble. "We're the only ones doing this as a service model and we're also the only ones doing a full-blown rebranding or co-branding capability where the partner can add this into their managed services portfolio, and take it to their customers and wrap around a lot of the services around that to make good money on it."

Eric Shorr, founder and president of Warwick, R.I.-based Secure Future Tech Solutions and Meru partner, said the product will allow his company to meet the needs of his clients.

’Our clients are seeking more ways to move and manage their IT infrastructure to the cloud," said Shorr. ’XPress Cloud allows us to meet those needs with a wireless solution that is easily managed and scalable as our clients evolve.’

SMEs globally account for approximately 95 percent of private-sector firms and employ more than two-thirds of workers, according to Meru. Supporting the increasingly high density of mobile devices in the workplace is a critical business function that is not achievable by consumer-grade Wi-Fi solutions currently used by smaller organizations.

Meru says XPress Cloud is designed to fill this gap and give SMEs enterprise-grade capabilities and intuitive management specifically designed to meet customer needs.

"With this solution, it allows our partners to really expand into the SME and distributor enterprise market with Meru, but also allows us to recruit new partners," said Frederick Harris, director of channel marketing at Meru.

Harris said they are launching a number of partner program recruitment activities in order to add to their roughly 1,000 partners across the globe. A key element to Meru's recruitment strategy, he said, is working with their distributors.

PUBLISHED FEB. 10, 2015