O2 has announced an additional 2 million of funding investment for partners to help further grow their businesses. The funding will be available in the first six months of 2010 to all current partners and to new ones that decide to join the O2 network.
O2 is providing incremental investment for incremental connections. The funding will help partners continue to leverage high-value customers, including iPhone and BlackBerry users, in addition to increasing overall sales.
The 2 million funding is in addition to any funding O2 is pushing into the channel currently. For example, if a partner sells a BlackBerry Smartphone connection, O2 will pay an incremental 100 per connection on top of what they are receiving already. 
Our channel partners are critical to our success and we have a strong belief in them as a community, says Telefonica O2 Business Sales Director, Ben Dowd. As such, we invest a lot of money each year supporting the partner channel, and have seen the results of that investment in terms of constant and continuing growth. This additional fund shows our appetite to help secure the future success and profitability of our entire partner channel.
O2 is also set to hand over more customers acquired through direct sales channels to Centre of Excellence partners who commit loyalty to the network and provide excellent customer service. This is on top of the 100,000 customers already handed to O2s Centre of Excellence partners earlier this year. These partners have increased this customer base by 18% during one of the toughest trading years. In addition, says O2, the churn rate through these partners has dropped by 6% in the past 12 months.
O2s Centre of Excellence is open to those partners that meet strict criteria and who are keen to form closer alignment with O2. Centre of Excellence partners benefit from a dedicated O2 Business Team providing support across sales, customer service and marketing, helping them better meet the needs of their customers.