Lindsay Zwart (Vodafone NZ)
Vodafone New Zealand has been crowned Palo Alto Networks' A/NZ service provider of the year for 2022.
The award, announced during Palo Alto Networks A/NZ partner summit, are presented to partners that excelled over the past year in performance, enablement and engagement
Performance is the bookings partners initiate, the pipeline they build, innovative new services launched and net new customers added.
Enablement is the number of Palo Alto Networks technical, pre-sales, sales and post-sales training and certifications completed, while engagement is nominated by the Palo Alto Networks team for exceptional engagement with Palo Alto Networks and its customers.
Vodafone NZ (soon to be One NZ) entered a strategic partnership with Palo Alto Networks in 2022 and achieved "incredible success" in their first transactional year, Palo Alto said.
A keystone of the partnership included the launch of Vodafone Secure Access powered by Palo Alto Networks to the local market last September.
The company built momentum within the first few months and has a strong joint pipeline of New Zealand businesses engaging with its own products powered by Palo Alto.
Vodafone NZ also embarked on enablement that saw over 30 staff accredited and certified across Palo Alto's range.
Vodafone chief enterprise officer Lindsay Zwart said working with partners like Palo Alto helps usher in a more efficient safer and more technologically enabled Aotearoa.
“The technology required to do business and do it well, is evolving at such a rapid rate that New Zealand businesses owners need to trust their providers to source them the best products," Zwart said.
Other companies Vodafone works with include cyber security architects Defend, in which Vodafone NZ made majority shareholding purchase earlier this year.
Palo Alto's director of channels and alliances A/NZ, Bryan Stibbard, said partners played a critical role in securing the tech-enabled future of the enterprise, especially true against a backdrop of challenges in 2022.
“Enterprises rely on Palo Alto Networks technology and our trusted partners to bring the services and solutions that offer choice, flexibility, and simplicity," he said.
"That adds up to better customer deployments and faster time to value."
