Preparing for 2026: What partners need to be aware of in the channel ecosystem

CRN Asia takes a look at three changes that vendors and partners are making that could impact the channel ecosystem in 2026.

2025 may have been a good year for most tech vendors and channel partners in Asia. However, the reality is the year was filled with many uncertainties, especially with the concern of tariffs and supply chains having a huge impact of how partners can plan their business.

While most vendors and partners were able to work their way around all the challenges throughout the year, 2026 is seemingly looking to bring more challenges and uncertainties as well.

CRN Asia takes a look at three changes that vendors and partners are making that could impact the channel ecosystem in 2026.

Consolidation of partner programs through acquisitions – There were many major acquisitions announced this year. The big ones include Palo Alto Networks’ acquisition of CyberArk and IBM’s acquisition of Confluent. There was also the completion of HPE’s acquisition of Juniper Networks. All these acquisitions would eventually lead to the convergence of partner programs. The question now is how will these programs impact partners? While many partners are excited about the opportunities to offer more products and services to customers, some will clearly struggle to cope as well.

New and enhanced partner programs – 2025 saw enhancements to some vendor partner programs as well as the launch of the new ones. The biggest change to partner programs would be VMware Broadcom’s new VMware Cloud Service Provider (VCSP) program that began on Nov. 1 with a slew of changes in store for partners. The other will be the Cisco 360 partner program which goes live in February next year. Google Cloud has also announced plans to launch a new partner program next year that will be more AI-driven to simplify the process for partners. While these new programs have been designed to provide partners with better opportunities and capabilities to reach out to new customers and support existing ones, some partners may still find it difficult to adopt these new programs.

For example, Cisco gave partners more than a year to understand how their new Cisco 360 partner program will work. The vendor also co-designed the program with a lot of feedback from their partners. But even with the workshops and events to share more about the changes to the program, some partners are still finding it harder to adopt the changes.

Rise of value-added distributors and value-added resellers – The days of pure play distributors and resellers are becoming numbered, especially in APAC. Conversations with vendors and partners throughout the year reveal that distributors and resellers are now focused on adding more value to the products they are offering as they realize this would enable them to get more profits. This includes services like consultation which a lot more distributors and resellers are moving into. Advisory and consultancy services are proving to be of greater need especially with organizations wanting to have the best plans and roadmap in their AI and tech journey.

Some distributors are also investing in developing AI use cases with vendors that they can easily provide to customers. These use cases are normally based on common customer challenges and can be adopted to different markets and industries in the region as well, making it simpler for the distribution and enablement of AI in organizations.

These changes and trends are based on conversations that CRN Asia has had with vendors and partners throughout 2025. While there is still time for partners to relook into their strategies and see how they can scale properly, the reality is, partners that have already adopted the changes will definitely have a head start compared to the rest.

What the industry says

At the recent GTDC APJ summit in Singapore, Frank Vitagliano, CEO of GTDC said, "Distributors have become an even more vital component of IT suppliers' market and sales expansion objectives in recent years, especially in the ultra-competitive cloud, cybersecurity and AI fields that require fast, cost-effective growth. An optimal distribution strategy boosts channel performance and ROI and provides greater incentives for everyone, including current and potential investors."

Vendors have stated that partners would need to be ready to use AI to enhance their capabilities and be subject matter experts, especially when dealing with customers.

Chetan Krishnamurthy Vice President, Ecosystem and Digital Sales, IBM APAC, stated that speed and scale will be key to growing volume and velocity for IBM partners. This includes the need to automate some processes to make it more seamless for both partners and customers.

Meanwhile, Jacob Pereira, Head of APAC Partnerships at Zoom believes that 2026 will see a new breed of partners rising, especially with the enhancements Zoom has made to its partner program and also the increasing demand from customers to have more products and services.

For Suchanda Mandal, VP of APAC partnerships at Cloudflare, the vendor is on a journey to become 90% partner. Speaking to CRN Australia, Mandal explained that to grow the channel, first, they need to be ready and their partners need to be ready. This includes investing in people and process technology to make it easier for partners to do business with Cloudflare.

Damien Wong, Senior Vice President for Asia Pacific and Japan (JAPAC) stated that while Tricentis does not work 100% through partners, his desired end state is that every customer should have partners that work with them. Wong believes that training and enablement actually help partners address challenges they face. It’s also why Tricentis is very focused on helping ensure partners are well-trained, well-certified, and that they understand that as the portfolio evolves.

Other vendors and partners have also shared their views on the opportunities and challenges that they have experienced and also expecting in the future. At the end of the day, the channel ecosystem will very much be dependent on how both partners and vendors make it seamless to deal with customer demands in 2026.