"A lot of complaints from our partners"

WE FINALLY KNOW it thanks to this comment:

"We had a lot of complaints from our partners," Colado acknowledged in an interview just before the holidays, after he had spent two months meeting with solution providers. "We had a lot of partners complain about their profitability [and how] they were not able to make money working with us. Most of the partners perceived us as a very difficult company to work with. And partners had the perception that they had to invest more in us than we were investing in them."

The text comes from an article that CRN has just removed (more on that later), but here is the corresponding Google Cache for those who are curious and want to see it for themselves.

So, Novell is a little like Microsoft, which keeps exploiting or betraying its partners. In Microsoft's case, many partners stay simply because Microsoft leaves them no other choices. It sabotages the competition in attempts to monopolise and thereby control margins.

Looking a little deeper at Colado's departure from this role, we discover some more interesting facts.

The press release actually does mention Volker Smid:

He replaces Volker Smid who has held the post since December 2006, and is leaving to pursue other interests. Mr. Colado will assume his new role after concluding his current assignment of creating and launching Novell's next-generation global channel and partner program. Upon Colado's assumption of the EMEA president role, his partner responsibilities, including the execution and leadership of Novell's partner programs, will transition as planned to Novell's marketing organization and report to John Dragoon, who will continue to serve as Novell's chief marketing officer.

This was covered very extensively in publications that include:

ChannelWeb: Novell to shuffle EMEA executive pack

Colado’s previous partner responsibilities, including the execution and leadership of Novell’s partner programmes, will be moved to Novell’s marketing organisation led by John Dragoon, chief marketing officer at Novell.

PhonePlusMag: Novell Promotes Chief Out of Channel

More than half of Novell’s total sales are indirect.

CRN: Novell Veteran To Assume Channel Chief Post

Novell chief marketing officer and senior vice president John Dragoon will take over the role of channel chief following Wednesday's announcement that Javier Colado, who was named head of the software company's channel operations in September, is being promoted to president of Novell EMEA.

CRN removed an article bearing the headline "Novell Launches Four-Point Initiative For Channel Partners." It also published the article "Novell Channel Chief Post Vacant - Again." It might be a similar/same article, but the URL and headline are different.

Novell did not immediately name a channel chief successor. A spokesman said the company's channel operations would be managed for the time being by John Dragoon, senior vice president and chief marketing officer. The spokesman couldn't say how long it would take to appoint a new channel executive.

Well, he put a Microsoft employee in change. We already know that [1, 2].

Colado joined Novell in 2006, according to this new article.

Colado joined Novell in 2006 as area general manager and vice president for western EMEA where he was responsible for all sales and marketing operations.

Dragoon joined in 2003, so he's relatively new as well.

Dragoon joined Novell in 2003 as vice president of marketing for the Americas. He was appointed senior vice president and chief marketing officer in 2006 and is responsible for all aspects of Novell's marketing strategy and activities worldwide, including corporate marketing, field marketing, partner and channel marketing, product and solution marketing, sales enablement and marketing operations functions. Prior to Novell, Dragoon held senior executive positions at Art Technology Group, Internet Capital Group and IBM.

Another fairly recent joiner is the CEO of Novell (he came from IBM, just like Jaffe). Here are his latest remarks on the transition:

“The work Javier and John have done together on our new partner and marketing programmes will assure their seamless and integrated execution, upon the transition of the partner responsibilities to John," asserted Hovsepian.

This transition is not good news. Moreover, the reasons for it (namely an executive quitting and the channel strategy which is failing) leave a dark cloud over Novell's head. Novell's annual bash was unexpectedly canceled [1, 2, 3]. ⬆

Still operating at a considerable loss