Cisco aims to double the level of financing deals that it supports through the channel. With the US currently with around 18% of its business financed by Cisco itself, Europe, with under 10% is seen as having some catching up to do.

With this is mind, it has expanded the Cisco Capital EasyLease zero-percent financing scheme to include all Cisco products and solutions, while doubling the maximum deal size to €250,000. The minimum Cisco content of the deal stays at 70%.

And Cisco has confirmed that the financial terms are now as important, if not more important than the technology. Stuart Hall, European markets business development manager says the focus has changed, and that Cisco partner training would reflect this. "Now that the partner is talking not to the CIO, but the senior business management, the message is all about the language used in that discussion."

He confirmed an earlier IDC report that choice of finance is critical to a deal, and that now the big banks have dropped out of the market, the competition is often between the big IT companies working through their partners with funding as well as technology.