HP prints more money for channel

Rebekah O'Flaherty, vp and GM South Pacific, IPG, said the company will offer rebates of up to seven percent for MFP partners and has “doubled” rebates for service and solutions specialists. Most of IPG's growth will come from partners who fall into these two segments, O'Flaherty said.

O'Flaherty said HP is revving up its channel to sell the benefits of converting analogue printing environments to digital printing. She claimed that only four percent of total pages printed worldwide are done so using digital printing devices such as digital presses and large format machines.

Under the new IPG framework, the company has introduced three new channel categories; services and solutions, MFP and Designjet specialists.

Channel partners in the services and solutions category are required to have three certified sales staff and one technical staffer and a commitment to co-fund lead generation.

MFP or multi-function device partners are required to one dedicated staffer in each state, demo stock and planned marketing activities while Designjet partners which sell the large format printers must meet a sales quota, have skilled sales staff, demo equipment and a marketing plan.

MFP specialists to date include Leading Solutions, Commander, CoEfficiency, TFS and ComputerCorp. Services specialists include the likes of CSC, Data #3, Fujitsu, NetOptions and BCA, while some Designjet partners include Plotting Technology Supplies, and Ultimate Design Graphics. HP is in the process of signing new channel agreements in these categories.