Hughes continued: “Barracuda is known for its data and network security solutions for small-to-midsize business (SMB) customers. When we engineered our Cloud Ready solutions for Azure, it quickly became apparent that we had the unique opportunity to provide needed security to customers of all sizes, but especially enterprise accounts who were not getting what they needed from their current providers.”
Co-selling through Microsoft has been a significant benefit for Barracuda, Hughes said. In the case of a very large electronics supplier, Microsoft sellers and Cloud Solution Architects worked hand-in-hand with the Barracuda team to create a compelling proof-of-concept and conclude a deal that has resulted in additional wins at the customer’s subsidiaries in the US and abroad.
Microsoft introduces Barracuda to Altogee
The Microsoft Partner-to-Partner sales motion has also benefited Barracuda. “While Barracuda is primarily a partner-driver organization, very often the preferred partner for a given prospect hasn’t yet worked with Barracuda,” Hughes said. “That was the case with Aviapartner, the company that manages logistics at Belgium’s busy Brussels Airport. Their IT partner is Altogee, a Microsoft Gold Partner and a ‘born in the cloud’ services provider.”
“We had not worked with Barracuda before, but Microsoft recommended them,” said Dirk Laurijssen, ICT Architect from Altogee. “Together, we have created the perfect solution for Aviapartner. Based on the power of the products and the responsiveness of the Barracuda team, they will likely become our ‘go-to’ for customers migrating to Azure.”
Events and lead gen campaigns add value
According to Hughes, Barracuda’s participation in Microsoft events has been a great sales enabler as well. One customer Barracuda connected with as a result of participating in Microsoft events was Aevitae, a leading Dutch insurance proxy company that protects thousands of individuals across the Netherlands.
“Because they understood our issues, the team at the Microsoft Experts event we attended could match us up with Barracuda, which was the perfect solution for us,” said Pascal Wenders, ICT Team Leader at Aevitae. “We have experience with all the leading firewall vendors, but only Barracuda could provide a solution that showed us our data both within our own data centers and behind the Azure firewall.”
Hughes said that Barracuda has also leveraged lead generation campaigns and content creation opportunities available to them as partners with Microsoft. “Often, these benefits have had unforeseen added value,” Hughes said. “For example, when the Microsoft team helped connect Barracuda with some of the vertically-focused sales teams at Microsoft, we found we could easily turn generic content into vertical-specific assets that helped land new customers.”
According to Nicole Napiltonia, Vice President of Alliances at Barracuda Networks, Microsoft has been invaluable in helping socialize the Barracuda value proposition across the Microsoft seller population. “Our solutions are valuable to Microsoft Azure sellers not only by themselves, but because of the consumption and workload migrations they drive,” she said. “The Microsoft team have provided numerous opportunities for us to show our value-add through webinars, white glove events, and Microsoft-focused content. As sellers understood how we removed blockers to Azure consumption, our co-sell opportunities grew accordingly.”
As a testament to their successful partnership with Microsoft, Barracuda Networks was awarded the Independent Software Vendor (ISV) Azure Partner of the Year at the 2016 Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, and continues to work closely with the Microsoft team to grow their Azure business.