European managed services provider Claranet has been awarded Amazon Web Services (AWS) Premier Consulting Partner status, in recognition of the strength of its AWS practice. Claranet becomes the first provider from Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Managed Hybrid Cloud Hosting, Europe 2016, and one of only ten services providers in Europe, to have achieved the distinction to date. The AWS Partner Network (APN) is a tiered programme designed to help partners build a successful AWS stream for their business.
The criteria for achieving Premier Partner status encompass technical expertise, and successful AWS business practices and proven deployments. Premier Consulting Partners must have a strong roster of certified and trained technical consultants, an APN DevOps Competency and at least one other APN Competency. Premier Partners must also have a healthy, revenue-generating business on AWS, underpinned by significant investment in their AWS practice and a track-record of success in deploying customer solutions on AWS.
Claranet offers a holistic hybrid IT approach and is making strategic investments to build a European-wide centre of excellence for delivering managed services on third-party cloud platforms. To this end, the company acquired AWS-specialist IT services providers in Spain (Celingest) and France (Morea) in 2015 and in the UK (Bashton) in early 2016. Its AWS clients today include BBC Worldwide, Dassault, ITV, Liverpool Football Club, Orange, Superdry, and Virgin Holidays.
Olivier Beaudet, CMO of Claranet, said: “Achieving Premier Partner status is an important development for Claranet, and one that reflects the investments we have made thus far in AWS over the past few years. We see AWS as a true enabler of business agility and it forms a critical part of our product roadmap and corporate strategy. Being a Premier Partner means that we will be able to work much more closely with AWS to help our customers take advantage of the platform and transform their businesses.
“There is a huge appetite for AWS in the market, but many businesses – particularly those in the mid-market – have historically been locked out of taking advantage of the enormous benefits because they lack the necessary skills. Partner programmes enable organisations to take advantage of the highly innovative infrastructure offered by AWS, but with additional services and support,” Beaudet continued.
The Premier Consulting Partner status enables Claranet access to a variety of special partner privileges. These include attendance at rigorous AWS Professional Service Boot Camp Training sessions, Customer Facing Joint Webinars with AWS, and the employee status of AWS Partner Account Manager and AWS Solution Architect.
