Teaming with Business Partners updates

The Information Management Think Thursday webcast series is an enablement series designed to help you help you grow your pipeline and improve productivity. Block your calendar each Thursday at 10:00 a.m. EST, when we will cover sales, marketing and other hot topics that you are asking for.

Bookmark our Think Thursday web page, where you can find detailed descriptions of upcoming webcasts. In addition, if you have a topic to propose for an upcoming webcast, you can submit your requests there.

In order to make it easier for you to access and leverage demand generation resources for Information Management, we recently consolidated all of our key resources onto one PartnerWorld page. These resources are broken down by capability, and include:

• Data Management
• Data Warehousing and Analytics
• Information Governance
• Information Integration

The Information Management Demand Generation web page provides an easy reference for IBM Business Partners who participate in Software Co-Marketing to find executable campaigns that are eligible for reimbursement. We’ll be updating this page frequently, so bookmark it and you’ll always have the Information Management demand generation resources you need at your fingertips.

Join us in Las Vegas, October 21 - 25, 2012 for Information On Demand 2012. Hear from thought leaders and renowned experts who will share ways to harness the power of today’s unprecedented volume, variety and velocity of data. Gain insights into new and innovative strategies that will accelerate your Information Management, Enterprise Content Management and Business Analytics practices. Discover the latest IBM products and solutions, and receive the very best technical and business education.

When you join us, you'll be among more than 11,000 attendees expected at the conference. Access the best technical education IBM has to offer with 700+ technical sessions and hundreds of world-class experts. Register before August 31 to take advantage of Early Bird savings ($300 USD) and get the best savings on hotel accommodations.

Attend the Business Partner Summit

Join us for the Business Partner Summit, October 20 and 21. The Business Partner Summit is complementary for IBM Business Partners, and is a great way to gain valuable skills and insights into success strategies, new offerings and opportunities.

Sponsor the EXPO

The EXPO at Information On Demand 2012 offers you a chance to showcase products and solutions in the conference's common gathering place. Enquire about special incentives for sponsoring and exhibiting, and take advantage of Early Bird pricing before August 31.

IBM is committed to supporting an ecosystem of skilled IBM Business Partners. In support of that commitment, IBM will be moving several products from Open distribution to Software Value Plus (SVP) Authorized distribution, effective July 1, 2012.

The following Information Management products are moving from Open Distribution to IBM Data Management Authorized Distribution:

• DB2 Express Edition
• DB2 High Availability Feature
• Informix Express Edition
• InfoSphere MashupHub

IBM Business Partners may view the announcement letter for a complete list of affected IBM Software products (PDF, 29KB) and the authorized Products Groups to which they are moving. For those IBM Business Partners already SVP Authorized for IBM Data Management, there is no action required.

IBM Business Partners who are not yet SVP Authorized for the IBM Data Management capability must complete the authorization requirements by July 1, 2012 in order to continue to sell these products. More information on how to apply, including required sales and technical mastery tests, is available on the IBM Software Value Plus pages. You are urged to start working on your certification now, so you'll be ready to sell after that date.

If you have questions or require assistance, please visit the IBM Software Value Plus page, or contact your IBM representative.