Five vendors have achieved the Champion status in the 2022 Canalys APAC Channel Leadership Matrix: Check Point, Dell Technologies, Nutanix, Palo Alto Networks and Trend Micro. Two of these vendors, Nutanix and Trend Micro, retained their Champion status from 2021 – an impressive achievement, requiring them to deliver improvements on an already strong performance achieved in the previous year.

A vendor’s position in the Canalys Leadership Matrix is based on partner feedback to the Canalys Vendor Benchmark, combined with a detailed assessment of their recent channel activities and future prospects by Canalys analysts. Champions have demonstrated the highest levels of excellence in channel management over the last 12 months compared to their industry peers, as rated by channel partners in the Canalys Vendor Benchmark and Canalys analysts. They have also achieved the challenging task of improving their performance on the previous year.

Canalys assessed over 20 technology vendors with significant channel businesses in APAC. Other vendors are classified as Contenders (with higher channel ratings than peers but declining on last year), Scalers (improvements in partner sentiment but yet to achieve the highest levels of excellence in channel management) or Foundation (vendors with the lowest ratings compared to peers, which have also suffered a deterioration in partner sentiment over the last 12 months).

Macroeconomic uncertainties have slowed global tech growth and created supply constraints, thereby adversely affecting the year-on-year channel growth rates. Changes in the IT industry dynamics, driven by macroeconomic factors and digitalization, requires the channel to evolve. But the APAC channel remains optimistic amid challenges. End-customer reliance on the channel continues to grow with the increase in IT complexities, rising cybersecurity threats and the increased adoption of consumption-based models in the region. The channel remains more important than ever and many IT vendors are looking to the channel as a key route-to-market for their APAC expansion plans. Effective partnerships are critical for success, especially in the APAC region where there are many differences between countries and sub-regions.

Vendor success is based on a complex mix of support, training, collaboration, co-sell and demand creation, while providing the technology programs, tools and platforms to manage a broadening and diverse partner ecosystem. Vendors that prioritize relationships with their partners while optimizing and simplifying partner programs, continue to see strengthened partner sentiment. The challenge for vendors in the region is to drive more engagement with the channel and continue strengthening partner sentiment over the next 12 months.

The Vendor Benchmark provides the basis for the Leadership Matrix report. The Vendor Benchmark is an online tool exclusively available to clients of Canalys’ Channels Analysis and Partner Program Analysis services. It assesses channel partners’ views of technology vendors, rating them across 12 areas of channel management. Scores are collected on an ongoing basis from channel partners via our Candefero community of 18,000+ members.