IBM focused on driving volume and velocity with partners in 2026

“Our core focus for 2026 is all about scaling business opportunities. We are in the business of doing business. In order for us to achieve this, there has to be focus, volume and velocity,” says Kareem Yusuf Ph.D., SVP, Ecosystem, Strategic Partners and Initiatives at IBM.

At the IBM APAC Ecosystem Growth Summit in Da Nang, Vietnam, IBM shared its vision and goals for 2026 for its partner ecosystem in the APAC region. The summit, which was attended by IBM partners from Australia and New Zealand, ASEAN, India, Greater China as well as Korea also celebrated the success of partners for the year.

Looking at 2026, Kareem Yusuf Ph.D., SVP, Ecosystem, Strategic Partners and Initiatives at IBM shared that the goal for next year is all about scaling business opportunities to scale business revenue for both IBM and its partners.

In his keynote address, Yusuf stated that increasing volume and velocity of products with partners will be an integral part of their journey in 2026 as IBM looks to increase its growth in the region.

“It’s all about driving more volume with partners and scale our value proposition. We have been spending a lot of time thinking about our products and value proposition and we want to build a streamline route in the region,” said Yusuf.

Specifically, Yusuf explained that IBM will be focused on scaling the reach of partners as they look to drive more business with more customers. In 2026, IBM intends to focus on select territories in the region with about 20 or so products which it believes partners can use to reach customers and scale the opportunity.

“Our core focus for 2026 is all about scaling business opportunities. We are in the business of doing business. In order for us to achieve this, there has to be focus, volume, and velocity. My focus remains to continue to tune and tweak and ensure we can have a vibrant ecosystem that shows value to clients as well as value to ourselves,” added Yusuf.

Volume and velocity needs speed and scale

For Chetan Krishnamurthy Vice President, Ecosystem and Digital Sales, IBM APAC, 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.

“The big focus this year and the big focus next year, and even the year after, are going to be on transforming to reduce friction in the selling process. Fiction for the channel needs to be variable,” said Krishnamurthy during a panel discussion with Namrata Kapur Director, APAC Growth Marketing at IBM.

Krishnamurthy explained that this year, the focus of IBM was to take off manual processes that may exist within the system to make it easier to generate reports, to make it easier for IBM to feature the sponsors and to reduce the number of back and forth between IBM, sellers, and the ecosystem.

“That's been the big focus this year. We've spent a lot of time on it. Ideally, we'll make some improvements to what is out in the market. We've learned from it, and that's what we're going to do. And more importantly, the effort is also on making the entire SaaS generation as simple as possible, which means the time that we actually procure and the time that we provide them needs to be really small,” explained Krishnamurthy.

For Krishnamurthy, this means some IBM products need segmented services as IBM is focused on enterprises. However, he would like to commit to having the cycle shortened from the time of the offering to the point where it's proven.

“We have to have a meet, and we need to go back to the client to help them understand usage and actually dive into the process better. So, this is automation within our systems, which we are actually working on. Product enhancements, which are underway, and we'll see a lot of that come through. And most importantly, investment of skilled professionals, especially in the customer success space, is essential. We need to guide people through this whole SaaS journey,” added Krishnamurthy.

With that said, IBM will be focusing on making sure that everyone in the partner ecosystem is a subject matter expert with deep expertise as well as drive sharper campaigns with the highest integrity as they look to grow the volume and velocity of IBM products in 2026.