News
Microsoft's Margin Sharing Scheme for CSPs and ISVs Hits Public Preview
- By Gladys Rama
- October 15, 2021
A new capability called "CSP margin sharing" in Microsoft's partner solutions marketplace is now available for all ISVs to test drive.
Microsoft launched the public preview of the margin sharing capability this week, following a private preview earlier this summer at the Inspire partner conference.
Margin sharing is meant to encourage more collaborations between ISVs selling their applications on the Microsoft commercial marketplace and the 90,000-plus roster of Microsoft Cloud Solution Providers (CSPs).
Under the margin sharing model, an ISV can list their application on the marketplace with one price for direct customers and a discounted price for CSPs. The idea is to incentivize CSPs to resell ISV solutions as part of their own catalogs or as a bundled service.
The benefits are multifold, according to Jake Swenson, Microsoft's head of Commercial Marketplace, and Tanuj Bansal, general manager of Microsoft Azure marketing. The two described the new feature in the blog post announcing the public preview.
"By selling through the partner ecosystem, ISVs can grow their business by expanding into new markets and acquire new customers -- all without adding any operational cost," they wrote. For CSPs, the benefit is the ability to "expand their catalog with new ISV solutions from the commercial marketplace to provide customers end-to-end solutions."
"This creates stronger, better together, partner-to-partner opportunities to help our partners grow their business while helping Cloud Solution Partners attain new revenue streams."
Microsoft first described the margin sharing plan at its Inspire partner conference this past July. It was one of several announcements aimed at urging partners to take advantage of the co-selling opportunities in its commercial marketplace. For instance, the company also at the time announced its plan to significantly reduce commercial marketplace fees for partners from 20 percent to 3 percent.
"By empowering partners to work together through the commercial marketplace -- we are reinforcing our commitment as the most partner-focused business platform," Swenson and Bansal said.