Become a Portainer Partner

As Portainer grows, so does the opportunity to partner with us. Right now, we're interested in building relationships with technology resellers, ISVs, consulting firms, cloud hosting providers and other technology companies that 'get' what we're trying to do and want a part of our future.

We operate a range of partner programs, from essential product enablement and sales collaboration through to long-term strategic alliances. All our programs are designed to grow your revenues as well as ours.

When you submit the form, you'll get a 45 minute dedicated Zoom call with a product expert and the partner team who will:

show you Portainer Business Edition in action,
discuss your specific situation
answer any questions you might have from a technology or partnership perspective.

And from there, we'll work out if there's alignment and figure out how we can work together to create real long-term value for everyone.

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are some commonly asked questions. If the question you have is not answered here then please ask when submitting the form. We are happy to help.

Why does Portainer have a Partner Program?

Containers are a significant change in software deployment and app development. All parts of the IT ecosystem have a role to play in the transition. Portainer wants to join with a range of other parties to assist end users to make the change, and enjoy the benefits. As Portainer continues to experience global uptake of our software, the opportunity for Partners to become involved in that growth has arisen.

Where did Portainer come from?

Portainer was born in 2017 from our founder’s own challenges in managing complex containerized environments. They set out to create a simple, expert platform to manage containerized applications - regardless of orchestration, on-premise, at the edge or in the cloud.

The result was Portainer's open source software project, Portainer CE. Its success has been amazing. At last count Portainer CE has over 600,000 global users and is growing strongly. The project has been expanded to include support for Kubernetes, Nomad and Azure ACI as well as retaining full support for Docker & Docker Swarm

In December 2020 Portainer Business Edition(BE) was launched, which added a range of paid premium features (as well as success and support) to the open source version. The launch of a commercial version of Portainer has created an opportunity for a range of partnering opportunities.

What Partner types are available, and why more than 1?

There are a range of roles in the IT ecosystem, and helping customers adopt new technology will involve almost all of them. The Portainer Partner Program has been designed around the following partner types:

Referral Partner for organisations that like to to refer or recommend useful technologies.
Transactional Reseller – these partners help the customer by dealing with the transaction and taking away hassles of vendor onboarding, payments etc.
Value-Added Reseller (VAR) or System Integrators (SI) typically engage with clients through a range of design and implementation services. Digital transformation, microservices and containers will be high on the list. As a Partner, they would build Portainer into their thinking, bringing the benefits of Portainer directly to their projects and their clients.
Managed Service Provider (MSP) - Portainer is a great platform to manage multiple client environments
Cloud Service Provider (CSP) - CSP’s typically offer Portainer as a management portal for their own Container Service offering.
Independent Software Vendor (ISV): As the use of containers becomes a preferred method for ISV’s to distribute and deploy their products, the complexity of the underlying platform technology can be problematic. By deploying Portainer BE alongside their application, many ISV’s have found sales cycles reduced and a significant reduction in post-sale support issues.
Technology Partner: Portainer offers a range of bespoke agreements where the Partner’s products and Portainer form a bundle.

What are the Partner benefits?

Depending upon the Partner type, a range of benefits are available. These include various margin opportunities, generally determined by the role and degree of involvement a Partner plays with the product and the customer.

Beyond margin, being a Portainer Partner opens a range of opportunities to be at the leading edge of technical transformation. Portainer offers training, sales support and ongoing technical support as well as NFR licenses for internal use. Being a Portainer Partner places a Partner in the very centre of a customers acceleration and growth with technology.

Do you have deal registration? Yes

What are the next steps?

Download our Partner Program guide, which expands on this Q&A. If you are interested, and if you believe you have a significant opportunity for both of us (Partners right?), fill out the form and we will be in contact.