Were Senforce's Channel Plans Sincere?

On July 5, 2005, Senforce president and CEO Mike Hall told CRN that within a year he wanted the Draper, Utah, maker of end-point security products to be doing 90 percent of its business through channel partners. To stimulate the change, a new partner program and channel sales organization was being put in place, he said. A new Senforce channel chief was to hopefully be named by August that same year, Hall added. "We will build a midmarket channel next quarter," Hall said then.

Senforce's latest OEM deal, announced Wednesday with network client management vendor Altiris, Lindon, Utah, puts the balance of direct, channel, and OEM sales at about 70 percent, 20 percent, and 10 percent, respectively, said Scott Richards, vice president of product management and engineering for Senforce, and the No. 2 exec in the company.

"To date we are still pretty much all a direct seller," said Richards, who added that the channel program announced by Hall a year ago was "still underway."

Calls to Senforce requesting comment from Hall were not returned.

In December, Senforce announced a Senforce Endpoint Security Technology and Channel Partner Program targeted specifically at the enterprise and government markets, and overseen by vice president of worldwide sales Ed McGarr, according to the vendor.

Senforce, which has OEM deals with a number of wireless vendors, is looking to increase its share of OEM sales, said Richards. The deal announced today lets Altiris rebrand and resell Senforce's solution as the Altiris Endpoint Security Solution, said Richards. The OEM deal with Altiris resulted from a development partnership announced in April between the two vendors. Altiris Endpoint Security Solution ships August 3, said Richards.