Google's engineering and product teams cooperated closely with SADA during the development of the product, he told CRN.

In the modern channel landscape, where partners must differentiate themselves to thrive, developing software helps a solution provider like SADA plant a flag in an industry vertical, which is why the line is now blurring between VARs and ISVs.

"Instead of constantly asking Google for leads and asking for companies that need support, we want to make a larger claim that this is our model of partnering and penetrating a space," Skoglund said.

At first, it was challenging competing for development talent with tech giants. But SADA now employs developers from Google, Yahoo! and Apple, he said, and its current crop of developers help the company recruit new ones.

SADA has been expanding its technical acumen by recruiting developers from around the world and bringing them to its headquarters in Southern California. And the company's growing stock of development resources support its services initiatives, Skoglund told CRN.

"The product team enables our services teams," he said.

Google Cloud is the backbone of the company's efforts to develop its own intellectual property.

"Google is focused on being a ubiquitous platform," Skoglund said. "We want to hone in on those verticals."

That's a dramatic shift from integration and managed services, one that makes it likely SADA will launch its own channel one day, allowing other Maps resellers to bring Atom to market.