VMWare Consulting and Training Credits

eMeS

Does anyone have any experience with purchasing these from a reseller?

See http://mylearn.vmware.com/lcms/mL_faq/1016/Credits_FAQ_Customers_June.PDF

30 credits are required as a substitute for tuition for the VMware Infrastructure 3: Install and Configure V3.5 class.

It might be possible to purchase enough credits from a reseller to significantly lower the cost of this class...I'm wondering if anyone has done this or knows of a reseller that regularly sells these credits below list price?

Also, once you buy the credits from a reseller, is it possible to then sell those credits to someone else? I can't seem to find anything about this on their site.

BTW, I don't intend to seem "cheap", I'm just one of those guys that always looks for the lowest possible price and highest quality in whatever I am buying.

MS

astorrs

The're not really transferable, or at least not easily. You essentially assign them to your employees and allow them to use the to take whatever courses they need. While the price goes down the more you buy and in theory a reseller could use them to provide discounted training packages for outsiders the complexity of implementing it when using VMware's assignment system could be more than its worth - I don't know anyone doing this.

Aside from buying them using the standalone SKUs mentioned in that PDF you can also get them bundled with the product in one of their "kits" (e.g., http://store.vmware.com/store/vmware/en_US/DisplayProductDetailsPage/productID.89251600 )

eMeS

Thanks astorrs.

Now for my next question....

This is just a thought, I'm definitely not ready to take action on it yet, but I wonder if we could get enough people on this board interested in order to significantly drive down the cost?

I really couldn't see it being worth it unless we were at the top pricing tier of $80 per credit.

Also, this would mean that someone's company would have to become a VMWare reseller. I'm happy to do that if it is a fit, but honestly I haven't investigated the requirements much at this point.

Just ramblings at this point...

MS

astorrs

We'd need to get almost 50 people signed up with "cash in hand" to make it work. I don't know if that's viable (for what amounts to ~ $600 off the cost of the course).

As for the reseller thing that's no problem. The program requirements are straight forward, especially if you have two VCPs on staff or under contract, then you apply as a VAC (VMware Authorized Consultant) partner.

eMeS

astorrs wrote:

As for the reseller thing that's no problem. The program requirements are straight forward, especially if you have two VCPs on staff or under contract, then you apply as a VAC (VMware Authorized Consultant) partner.

Ok, so I missed that point. To even become a reseller you have to have 2 VCPs onboard. I have exactly zero of those right now, so to achieve this individually the cost would be the same ~3k+4 days out of delivery.

Thanks,

MS