Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Opportunities for Resellers & VARs

In a recent Computer Reseller News "CRN" article by Jennifer Lawinski, I wanted to clarify my quote below.

"The device business was a very booming business for a number of years and we did quite well with that, but pretty much anything meaningful they've taken direct"

By "anything meaningful they've taken direct" , I am referring to the wireless carriers (Cingular, T-Mobile, NEXTEL / Sprint & Verizon). That is to say the largest customers and activation deals are being sold by the carrier sales reps directly to the customers. This is simply the natural evolution of any technology business. Now that the carriers have come up to speed on BlackBerry® and other Smartphone devices (as much as they feasibly can), their sales reps don't need to rely (as much) on the expertise of companies like REGARD to help close these deals.

As for the second part of that quote...

"...The most opportunity is in emerging software development companies, getting in early with them before their products start to go with distribution," Beauregard said. "A lot of those guys you can get margins of up to 40 [percent] or 50 percent because they're anxious to get their products out there."

Small technology companies must evolve with the changing dynamics. The big opportunities in wireless for resellers and VARs has now migrated to off-the-shelf wireless products like R-Approval®. In addition to making money on the sale of the software, VARs can also provide professional services to document and streamline approval workflow processes. Designing R-Approval templates based on existing paper approval forms can also be quite lucrative.

Other products are available for Flowfinity, Antenna Software and Wallace Wireless that offer similar opportunities for VARs on BlackBerry® and other wireless Smartphones.

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-Steve Beauregard

REGARD – “R-Solutions Liberate People From Their Desks”

310.883.2205 (direct dial)

310.450.2400 (main line)

http://www.regard.com (Corp Website)

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