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German Partner Was First to MPN Gold

For the record, the first Microsoft partner to achieve a gold competency under the revamped Microsoft Partner Network was IQ GmbH of Munich, Germany.

Microsoft rolled out the last piece of the overhauled MPN on Nov. 1, with the formal launch of the gold versions of each of the nearly 30 competencies.

On his Twitter feed on Friday, Microsoft's top worldwide channel executive, Jon Roskill, wrote, "Just had lunch with the partner who got the first Gold Competency!" The post had a link to IQ GmbH's site.

On Dec. 6, 2010, IQ GmbH had declared in a brief post on its Web site that it was the world's first Microsoft partner to earn a gold competency when it achieved Unified Communications and Software Asset Management within about a month of the competencies' gold launch. (Standard versions of the competencies, later renamed silver, were launched in May 2010).

In the meantime, the German firm has picked up another 11 gold competencies, according to the site. With 22, Avanade still has the most MPN gold competencies of any partner we've seen so far, but IQ's fast start and double-digit gold competency status shows an impressive commitment to the paperwork, retraining and all-around effort needed for MPN gold competencies.

Posted by Scott Bekker on May 24, 2011


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