Nectar Evolution is a cross-platform, UC-aware solution that utilizes Nectar’s dynamic, rules-based policy engine in conjunction with Cisco’s SDN Application Policy Infrastructure Controller - Enterprise Module (APIC-EM), to deliver unified QoS automation and verification across a Cisco wired or wireless infrastructure.

Nectar Evolution and APIC-EM Sales Guide

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Nectar Evolution

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Why is it worth my time?■ Cisco Digital Network Architecture (DNA) brings controller-

based automation, rich contextual analytics, network functions virtualization (NFV), and limitless scalability of the cloud to Cisco powered networks.

■ The APIC-EM delivers SDN to the Enterprise WAN, Campus and Access networks. APIC-EM provides centralized automation of policy-based application profiles with is EasyQoS functionality.

■ Nectar Evolution enhances APIC-EM’s EasyQoS by bringing Unified Communications awareness to APIC-EM.

Why is it worth my customer’s time?QoS is complex. In order to properly apply QoS in an environment customers must properly account for several different factors.

■ Multi-Vendor platforms

■ Various types of technology platforms that need different levels of QoS

■ Multiple modalities / media types

■ Complexity multiplied once spread across large geographic regions

The solution at-a-glance

Why Nectar Evolution?Evolution utilizes Nectar’s best of breed UC technology to monitor call control for registrations from UC devices. Evolution then passes this UC awareness to Cisco’s APIC-EM. APIC will then set the QoS policy for the UC devices on the network.

While improvements in Unified Communications (UC) features and functionality are continuing to drive its proliferation across the enterprise, a major obstacle remains: the ability to efficiently and cost-effectively deploy a consistent, end-to-end Quality of Service (QoS) across complex hybrid and geographically distributed networks that incorporates various platforms, media, and devices from multiple vendors.

Nectar Evolution — a cross-platform, UC-aware solution that utilizes Nectar’s dynamic, rules-based policy engine in conjunction with Cisco’s SDN Application Policy Infrastructure Controller — Enterprise Module (APIC-EM), to deliver unified QoS automation and verification across a Cisco network.

Target Market: Any enterprise with QoS and collaboration.

Business / Financial

■ Reduced time to deploy QoS for UC for improved user experience. Improves ROI for UC across the business

■ Improves UC return on investment (ROI) across the business

Operational

■ Automation reduces the cost to maintain QoS for UC

Technical

■ Policies automatically move with users reducing the number of calls to the help desk to report quality issues due to users moving around the network

■ Evolution ensures users receive proper QoS treatment regardless of the UC device they are registering with or currently using

Example Opportunity Areas

■ Greenfield Unified Communication (UC) deployments

■ Adding sites to an existing UC deployment

■ QoS is typically neither deployed nor available for Wi-Fi in most organizations. Deploying APIC-EM with Nectar Evolution will simplify the rollout for QoS deployment of Wi-Fi users and applications within organizations

■ Mobility - people moving around campuses plugging in and unplugging, on and off the wireless network

■ Wireless and network refreshes where new QoS configurations are being deployed

How do we compare with the competition?■ UC Monitoring Companies – Others will not be able to detect and

apply QoS policies for live calls through Dynamic QoS. Nectar has a unique ability to detect active calls on the network.

■ UC Application Providers - Other offerings are tailored to support a specific hosted application and would require 3rd party access through an organization’s network.

■ Service Providers – These offerings would optimize QoS only for the specified service they are delivering and typically only the connection at their data center.

Value of typical sale

Average incremental deal value

$150k annual recurring revenue for a typical deployment

Time to close Typically between 3-6 months

Up-sell and cross-sell opportunities

Cisco wired network refresh, Wi-Fi refresh, Cisco collaboration

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Why Cisco and Nectar?■ Cisco is ranked #1 in voice with 43% market share■ Nectar currently provides monitoring and diagnostics to many

of the largest enterprises and managed service providers in the world across every vertical

■ Nectar’s Deep History with Cisco■ Nectar’s long-standing development history and relationship

with Cisco■ Nectar’s customer-centric development with Cisco can

expedite enterprises moving to SDN by simplifying the management of large, complex, and multi-platform networks

Winning indicatorsWe win when we

■ Pro-actively engage with decision makers across the business

■ Involve BOTH Cisco and the Nectar early in sales cycle for converged solutions

■ Understand the customer’s QoS needs and plans

■ Match the value of APIC-EM to the customer’s needs

We lose when we

■ Don’t discover the business investment triggers for our solution

■ Don’t explain how APIC-EM and Evolution’s technology capabilities translate into business benefit

Critical business issues:■ QoS is typically neither deployed nor available for Wi-Fi in most

organizations. Deploying APIC-EM with Nectar Evolution will simplify the rollout for QoS deployment of Wi-Fi users and applications within organizations

■ Mobility - people moving around campuses plugging in and unplugging, on and off the wireless network

■ Wireless and network refreshes where new QoS configurations are being deployed

Problems caused by this cycle can be:

■ Policies can take a long time to implement and different QoS needs could surface at any point in this cycle.

■ Due to the complexity, some policies never get applied or companies may choose to ignore them due to the overwhelming complexity of fixing them.

■ Networks are never finished; there is a constant tweaking of policies, and a continual need to add and delete policies, as there are too many devices to maintain to effectively keep policies optimized.

Be sure to deal with the objectionsCustomer: We already have QoS deployed today, but I’m not comfortable with having APIC-EM taking over my QoS with QoS automation.

Response: QoS automation is new to the market and the great thing about Easy QoS with APIC-EM - is that it is not all-or-nothing scenario. You can start with a subset of devices at the edge, wireless where people do not typically have QoS today, or any new devices that are being turned up.

Customer: It takes too long to implement new QoS policies on my devices.

Response: APIC-EM pushes full best practices of QoS policies based on industry standards and years of leading the industry in QoS knowledge. Together, APIC-EM and Nectar Evolution can ensure that new or existing UC devices coming on and off the network will have policies applied and follow the user/device around the network in real-time.

Customer: I’m running a multi-vendor UC environment so not everything is Cisco UC.

Response: Nectar Evolution can support your CUCM, Skype for Business or Avaya environments.

Starting a conversation■ What is the typical time spent on UC deployments? For

example, how complex is it to add sites to your existing deployment?

■ Would you like to reduce the time it takes to add new sites?■ Would you like to reduce the complexity to your existing

deployment?

■ Does this sound familiar: QoS is applied to a specific port for a collaboration device only to have users move around and have no QoS on a new port they are plugged into and complain about call quality?

■ Are you having call quality issues over Wi-Fi?

■ Have you ever had issues with rolling out QoS changes?

■ How long does it take you to roll out QoS changes?

■ Have you considered Cisco’s APIC-EM for QoS deployments?

Who do I target?The principal members of the decision making unit are: ■ Director of Infrastructure

■ Application Owners e.g. UC Application (CUCM, Skype for Business)

■ CIO and/or CFO

Company financial and productivity time savings:

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The Solution

An industry first, Nectar Evolution integrates with the Cisco Digital Network Architecture (DNA) to automate quality of service (QoS) and verify best practices that previously were implimented manually. Nectar’s integration with Cisco DNA enables enterprises to optimize voice, video and collaboration experiences by providing unified QoS policy automation for Cisco UC environments, as well as multi-vendor deployments which include other UC platforms such as Microsoft Skype for Business and other third party ecosystem applications. It can set and remove QoS policy for endpoints that register or de-register from a Skype for Business and Cisco UCM system.

The Problem

While improvements in UC features and functionality are continuing to drive its proliferation across the enterprise, a major obstacle remains: the ability to efficiently and cost-effectively deploy a consistent, end-to-end Quality of Service (QoS) across complex hybrid and geographically distributed networks that incorporate platforms, media, and devices from multiple vendors. Today, this has been a lofty, labor-intensive process, oftentimes taking months to accomplish. The process of identifying, implementing and maintaining QoS across the enterprise’s UC network is complex and very costly. Eventually, due to an oversight or inconvenience of manually-implemented network policy changes, the needs for UC QoS is often put on the backburner by network administrators because of the sheer inefficiency. The primary challenge has been the inability to give proper QoS settings to multi-vendor wired and wireless UC clients.

How it Works

Nectar Evolution pairs its unparalleled multi-vendor UC network visibility and diagnostics with a quality automated QoS service that takes a significant burden off UC network administrators. It provides automated QoS when an authenticated and registered user enters or leaves their UC environment. It eliminates the need for on-going QoS changes throughout the network infrastructure.

Leveraging Cisco APIC-EM, Evolution ensures that the user receives the proper QoS regardless of the UC device and by designating and assigning the proper QoS, the network will operate at the highest performance standards. All of this results in Evolution saving significant time in network operations, which translates into more time available for the Enterprise to address other operational needs.

As a cross-platform, UC-aware solution, Evolution utilizes Nectar’s dynamic, rules-based policy engine in conjunction with Cisco’s SDN Application Policy Infrastructure Controller — Enterprise Module (APIC-EM), an integral module of Cisco’s DNA, to deliver unified Quality of Service (QoS) automation and orchestration across a Cisco wired or wireless infrastructure. By automating these previously manually-implemented practices, Nectar Evolution ensures that a registered UC user receives the proper QoS treatment anywhere in the network.

Solution Overview - What am I selling?

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Sales MapPlanning your saleThis Sales Engagement Model illustrates how others have successfully managed a sales campaign for this solution. It is not intended to replace an existing sales process or methodology you may be using; rather it’s intended as a complementary aid to help you plan the key activities and contributions of others in your selling team.

Starting the sale Discovery Solution Design Winning Vendor Selection

Cisco: AM (A), PAM (I)

Nectar: AM (A) Partner: AM (R)

To help guide sales teams that comprise members from different organizations and disciplines we’ve provided an example of who contributes at each stage in the sales cycle. ‘RACI’ provides high-level guidance on who is Responsible (R), Accountable (A), Consulted (C) or Informed (I). At each stage a contributor’s ‘RACI’ state might change depending on who is leading, perhaps from a commercial, technical or consulting perspective. Rather than being prescriptive, this is intended to illustrate sales best practice while selling this solution.

AM: Account Manager, SS: Solution Specialist, PSS: Cisco Product Sales Specialist, PAM/CDM: Cisco Partner Account Manager/Channel Development Manager, SE: Partner Pre-Sales Engineer,CCE: Cisco Consulting Engineers

Qualify ‘suspect list’ – use the Targeting Chart

Partner Identifies ‘Prospect’ and Flags to Cisco/Technology Partner

Joint Account Review and Sales Campaign Planning

LOB: Initiatives and Programs

Vision Pitch to sponsor – get introductions to LOB heads

Tech Triggers: EOL, refresh etc.

Central IT and LOB Alignment

Environment including:• APIC-EM Compute, Network & Storage Capacity• Connectivity with existing infrastructure• Applications• Virtualization• Security and Compliance

ROI and/or Business Case including:• Value to Lines of Business• Value to IT• Operational savings• Infrastructure/support Retirement

Decide if deal is worth chasing

Request qualification meeting

Permission to execute discovery meetings?

Manage POC/Demo (when possible)

Deal with the competition:• Establish preference• Articulate unique value

Submit final proposal• What?• Who?• When?• Terms and Conditions

Manage Negotiation

The investment alternatives: • Direct competition • Competition for the money

Cisco: AM (A), PSS (R)

Nectar: AM (R) Partner: AM (A) SE (R)

Cisco: PSS (A), SE/CSE (R)

Nectar: SE (C), AM (I) Partner: SE (R)

Cisco: PSS (A), AM(R)

Nectar: SE (A), AM (R) Partner: SE (R), AM (R)

‘Permissionto engage’

Alignment and

resources

Validatefindings and

case forinvestment

Initial Proposal

Presentation

Close andhandover for

Implementation

Pro-active selling

Reactive selling

A competitor is setting the agenda and creating the momentumRFx

arrivesSubmit

responseWait

Yes No Complete the fix

Win

Lose - Exit

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The more questions answered with a YES the better the prospect YES NO

1. Is the prospect planning any network or wireless refreshes?

2. Does the prospect have challenges with QoS today?

3. Does the prospect have any new needs for QoS changes?

4. Are there any issues with Unified Communication call and / or video quality?

5. Are they having quality issues over WiFi?

6. Does the customer have any network automation practices in place?

7. Are customers planning on adding any new location to their existing infrastructure?

8. Are they looking or have they looked at APIC-EM for EasyQoS or any other function of APIC-EM?

9. Do we have a senior advocate in the organization?

10. Can we get introductions to all of the decision makers? (remember you may need to talk to lines of business owners)

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■ Any enterprise with QoS and collaboration.

Finding the right prospects

■ UC QoS automation with Cisco APIC-EM and Nectar Evolution covers any organization utilizing Unified Communications.

To use this form, click here to open the document container, then right-click on the TARGET MARKETS TEMPLATE.pdf to Save Attachment

Important: DO NOT open the form straight from the document container as it will disable the ‘save’ feature.

Qualifying my Evolution prospectsThese questions will help you gauge the quality of the opportunity.

Target Markets

2017 Industry Awards Recognized for Nectar Evolution

Read about Frost & Sullivan Award Report for Nectar

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Tick the box that most represents your understanding ParametersLow 0 1 2 3 4 Parameters

HighWhat’s our plan to improve our score?

Action owner?

Target date

Situation Section Score:

What’s the Opportunity Assessment Score from the Targeting Chart? Minimum score

<50% 50%+ >75% 75% or more

Have we identified a compelling event driving the need for Unified Communications QoS automation? Not identified

Target date for achieving cost savings. New application go-live

date

Do they consume services and/or product from you today? No Yes

What is your gut feeling? Negative Strong

Will we have to participate in a RFx or Tender process with other vendors? RFx or Tender No/existing customer

Competition Section Score:

Have we overcome competition for budget from other IT initiatives? No Yes

If other IT solution vendors or managed service providers are being considered, have we created the competitive agenda on our terms? No

NeutralOur story is winning

Are we in a RFx process where we can influence the requirements? Yes Leading and influencingthe process

Basis of the decision Section Score:

If a proof of concept is necessary, have we created success criteria to measure against? No Yes

Have we understood their decision-making process? No Yes

Have we successfully utilized Cisco and Nectar references and/or Exec meetings to demonstrate our collective strengths? No

Reference call planned Reference call and/or Exec meeting completed

Have we identified the steps needed to close? No Yes

Timescale Section Score:

Can we identify an immediate need that will drive a decision now? No Yes

Do we need to conduct a proof of concept to accelerate their willingness to invest? No Yes

Have we engaged purchasing and legal early in the game? No Yes

Have we proposed a project plan to which both the partner(s) and the customer agree? NoWork in progress

Agreed

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To use this form, click here to open the document container, then right-click on the DEAL PLANNER TEMPLATE.pdf to Save Attachment

Deal Planner (part 1)

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Tick the box that most represents your understanding ParametersLow 0 1 2 3 4 Parameters

HighWhat’s our plan to improve our score?

Action owner?

Target date

Solution Section Score:

Are there any uncontrolled risks associated with the delivery, e.g. applications, timeline, or Professional Service resources? Yes No

Have we engaged with Cisco and/or Nectar on a vision pitch? No Yes or Not Applicable

Money: should we bid - is it worth winning? Section Score:

Is the deal size worth chasing? Too LowOK with pull thru

Worth chasing

Can the customer get the budget to spend in our current sales year? Next sales year Current sales year

Is there a pull-through for other products and services? NoYes

Yes and part of this sale

Will this maximize quota or incentive plan objectives? NoPartly

Yes

Authority and relationships Section Score:

Define our relationship with the decision-maker or team Weak Strong

Is there any clarity about roles and responsibilities with any other partners? NoOther partner leading

We are actively leading

Do we have a coach and are they effectively engaged to work with us? No Yes

Are we engaged with the key influencers, such as business users? No Yes

Need Section Score:

Is there a business case supported by the prospect’s decision makers? Still being discovered

Payback is >1 yearPayback is < 1 year

Can we link tangible business issues to our proposed solution? (e.g. IT resource recovery, cost reduction, new business-enabling applications)

None identified

Identified Identified and customer understands the linkage and value

Does the client agree that Cisco APIC-EM with Nectar Evolution will enable the business to increase opportunity and/or reduce cost? No

Opportunity up or cost down Opportunity up and cost down

Will their IT team recover resources – people or capital? NoWork in progress

People and capital

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Deal Planner (part 2)To use this form, click here to open the document container, then right-click on the DEAL PLANNER TEMPLATE.pdf to Save Attachment

Financial Business

Operational Technical

My customer’s top CBIs are:

Total

Nectar Evolution

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CiscoPlease contact your Account Manager or:

Get support for any partner issue, including pre-sales technical and product help:http://www.cisco.com/web/partners/support/index.html

Cisco Partner Community – This private forum is the ideal place for Cisco partners to come together to learn, share, and collaborate. https://communities.cisco.com/community/partner/solution-plus-partner/nectar

NectarFor general questions/information email:sales@nectarcorp.com

Partner Communities: Nectar on Linkedin

@NectarCorp

Related information for this solution

Understanding the Solution Solution Overview

Critical Business Issues

Directed Discovery Questions

Dealing with Objections

Sales Engagement Model

Understanding the Market Deal Planner

Targeting Chart

Cisco Partner Site Access Visit the Cisco’s Partner Central portal

Don’t have a Cisco Partner Central login?

Click here to request one

Already have a Cisco partner Central login?

Click here to login

Competitive and Other Cisco and Nectar?

Customer-Facing Collateral Evolution Datasheet

Evolution White Paper

Evolution - How It Works (Video)

Evolution - Frost & Sullivan: 2017 Global Enhanced User Experience for UC New Product Innovation Award Report

Cisco, Cisco UCS and the Cisco logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the U.S. and other countries.

The Nectar logo is a trademark of Nectar Services Corp. Other company, product, or service names mentioned herein may be trademarks or service marks of their respective companies. This document may contain forward-looking statements regarding future events or product enhancements. All statements other than present and historical facts and conditions contained in this document are predictions and reflect our current beliefs and expectations with respect to future events. Any forward-looking statements are based on information available to Nectar as of the copyright date, and Nectar assumes no obligation regarding such statements.

For more information go to: http://www.nectarcorp.com/evolution/.

Qualifying my Evolution prospects

Prospect Name Account Manager

Confidential - no external distribution – extracted from the Nectar Evolution Sales Guide

Clear form

Nectar Evolution

The more questions answered with a YES the better the prospect YES NO

1. Is the prospect planning any network or wireless refreshes?

2. Does the prospect have challenges with QoS today?

3. Does the prospect have any new needs for QoS changes?

4. Are there any issues with Unified Communication call and / or video quality?

5. Are they having quality issues over WiFi?

6. Does the customer have any network automation practices in place?

7. Are customers planning on adding any new location to their existing infrastructure?

8. Are they looking or have they looked at APIC-EM for EasyQoS or any other function of APIC-EM?

9. Do we have a senior advocate in the organization?

10. Can we get introductions to all of the decision makers? (remember you may need to talk to lines of business owners)

Your Name Your Company

Email Phone

Total /10

Opportunity Name

Nectar Evolution

Confidential - no external distribution – extracted from the Nectar Evolution Sales Guide 1Next >

Opportunity name Opportunity owner

Clear tableSub total:

Tick the box that most represents your understanding ParametersLow 0 1 2 3 4 Parameters

HighWhat’s our plan to improve our score?

Action owner?

Target date

Situation Section Score:

What’s the Opportunity Assessment Score from the Targeting Chart? Minimum score

<50% 50%+ >75%75% or more

Have we identified a compelling event driving the need for Unified Communications QoS automation? Not identified

Target date for achieving cost savings. New application go-live

date

Do they consume services and/or product from you today? No Yes

What is your gut feeling? Negative Strong

Will we have to participate in a RFx or Tender process with other vendors? RFx or Tender No/existing customer

Competition Section Score:

Have we overcome competition for budget from other IT initiatives? No Yes

If other IT solution vendors or managed service providers are being considered, have we created the competitive agenda on our terms? No

NeutralOur story is winning

Are we in a RFx process where we can influence the requirements? Yes Leading and influencingthe process

Basis of the decision Section Score:

If a proof of concept is necessary, have we created success criteria to measure against? No Yes

Have we understood their decision-making process? No Yes

Have we successfully utilized Cisco and Nectar references and/or Exec meetings to demonstrate our collective strengths? No

Reference call planned Reference call and/or Exec meeting completed

Have we identified the steps needed to close? No Yes

Timescale Section Score:

Can we identify an immediate need that will drive a decision now? No Yes

Do we need to conduct a proof of concept to accelerate their willingness to invest? No Yes

Have we engaged purchasing and legal early in the game? No Yes

Have we proposed a project plan to which both the partner(s) and the customer agree? NoWork in progress

Agreed

Deal Planner (part 1)

Nectar Evolution

Confidential - no external distribution – extracted from the Nectar Evolution Sales Guide 2< Previous

Deal Planner (part 2)

Clear table

Tick the box that most represents your understanding ParametersLow 0 1 2 3 4 Parameters

HighWhat’s our plan to improve our score?

Action owner?

Target date

Solution Section Score:Are there any uncontrolled risks associated with the delivery, e.g. applications, timeline, or Professional Service resources? Yes No

Have we engaged with Cisco and/or Nectar on a vision pitch? No Yes or Not Applicable

Money: should we bid - is it worth winning and can the customer justify the spend? Section Score:

Is the deal size worth chasing? Too LowOK with pull thru

Worth chasing

Can the customer get the budget to spend in our current sales year? Next sales year Current sales year

Is there pull-through for other products and services? NoYes

Yes and part of this sale

Will this maximize quota or incentive plan objectives? NoPartly

Yes

Authority and relationships Section Score:

Define our relationship with the decision-maker or team Weak Strong

Is there clarity over roles and responsibilities with any other partners? NoOther partner leading

We are actively leading

Do we have a coach and are they effectively engaged to work with us? No Yes

Are we engaged with the key influencers - like the business users? No Yes

Need Section Score:

Is there a business case supported by the prospect’s decision makers? Still being discovered

Payback is >1 yearPayback is < 1 year

Can we link tangible business issues to our proposed solution? (e.g. IT resource recovery, cost reduction, new business-enabling applications) None identified

Identified Identified and customer understands the linkage and value

Does the client agree that Cisco APIC-EM with Nectar Evolution will enable the business to increase opportunity and/or reduce cost? No

Opportunity up or cost down Opportunity up and cost down

Will their IT team recover resources – people or capital? NoWork in progress

People and capital

Financial Business

Operational Technical

My customer’s top CBIs are: Total