Press Release

Novell Announces New Program for National Service and Consulting Organizations

Co-op Funding, Marketing Support Tools Available to Qualifying Partners

Orem, UT -- December 9, 1996 -- Starting today, service and consulting organizations that work with Novell products will be eligible to qualify for substantial funding and other support through an ambitious new program offered by Novell, Inc., the world's leading provider of network software. The National Service Partner (NSP) program, announced today by Novell, aims to promote the company's partners in the service and consulting industry by providing technical tools, marketing assistance, and other benefits to qualifying partners.

"Many of our partners have changed their business models from being resellers of shrinkwrap or licensed products to becoming service and consulting organizations," said Novell's Ron Heinz, senior vice president of sales, Americas. "The NSP program represents a major commitment at Novell to help them meet the challenges of servicing large corporate customers."

Novell's service and consulting partners have indicated their support of these efforts. "Novell has worked with the channel to develop a program that improves competitive advantage for the NSP partner and adds value for the customer," said Dennis Callagy, vice president of Remote Support Services for CompuCom Systems, Inc. "This program provides CompuCom with valuable resources to continue to build our network services business."

Chris M. Laney, senior vice president of Vanstar Corporation's Professional Services Organization, added, "The NSP program specifically targets Vanstar's Professional Services and gives us the needed tools and benefits to leverage our growing Novell consulting practice."

Co-Op Marketing Funds Available

The most significant benefit to NSPs is the availability of co-op marketing funds, to be used exclusively to develop their customer base and enhance their technical and consulting expertise. In addition, NSPs will be eligible to nominate one candidate within their organization to act as an "NSP champion," who will be partially subsidized for salary and travel expenses, receive in-depth product training at Novell, and attend Novell's Brainshare conference. The NSP champion will be responsible for promoting Novell and its products through demonstrations, mentoring, and suggesting new service programs for the NSP.

"Having this extra support significantly enhances the level of service we now can offer businesses with Novell networks," said Bill Bancroft, vice president of technical services for GE Capital IT Solutions. "By doing so, it also strengthens our overall services portfolio, better positioning us to deliver the solution best suited for each customer's needs. We are proud to be a charter member of this new service partnership."

Among the benefits, Novell will also provide these partners with free copies of Novell software for their internal business use. By standardizing on Novell products, partners can gain a broader and deeper understanding of IntranetWare, NetWare, Novell Directory Services (NDS), GroupWise, ManageWise, and the rest of the Novell family of solutions.

In addition, NSPs will have priority access to Novell's top technical support personnel 24 hours a day, plus proactive account management from Novell account managers and online incident submittal and tracking over the Internet.

Further, Novell will make available four CD ROM subscriptions, free of cost, to assist with the partners' marketing efforts:

  • Novell Consulting Services Toolkit: Geared toward consulting organizations and systems integrators, this CD contains a wide array of technical information and software utilities and provides cutting-edge design methodologies for Novell-based enterprise solutions.
  • Power Partner: This CD provides partners with a variety of demos, presentations, sales guides, and information about promotions. Novell provides frequent updates to the Power Partner information system with a dedicated Internet site.
  • Novell Support Connection CD: Partners can quickly find answers to many technical questions with this monthly CD, which contains updated information gathered from Novell support engineers, partners, and customers.
  • Novell Software Connection Library: Shipped bimonthly, this is a collection of CDs containing the current versions of Novell's most important products, to be used for internal business, product demonstrations, and training only.
Ensuring that high-quality service is maintained throughout the NSP program, Novell requires that partners meet several criteria in order to join. Among these requirements, companies must have at least 15 regional offices with at least 150 field consultants. They must also maintain a unified service and consulting desk to benefit all regional offices and operate a 24-hour help line for customers. Other requirements include participating in customer satisfaction surveys and providing periodic reports on the success of the NSP program.

About Novell, Inc.

Founded in 1983, Novell (NASDAQ: NOVL) is the world's leading provider of network software. The company offers a wide range of network solutions for distributed network, Internet, intranet and small-business markets. Novell education and technical support programs are the most comprehensive in the network computing industry. Information about Novell's complete range of products and services can be accessed on the World Wide Web at http://www.novell.com.

Press Contact:
Terri Molini
Phone: (408) 577-7887
Fax: (408) 577-5104
Internet: tmolini@novell.com