7. Divestitures Of Services Group

Dell sold its Dell Services business to NTT Data in the spring, opening a big opportunity for partners. The nearly $3.1 billion deal meant the end of Dell's stand-alone services division, and the company said it would begin relying on the channel to do that work.

Partners said the opportunities could be huge, especially for solution providers that have a good deal of engineering expertise. Dell EMC execs drove the point home during the Dell EMC World conference in October.

Channel Chief John Byrne called services a "pot of gold" for channel partners, saying, "It's a phenomenal opportunity for the channel ecosystem, the partner ecosystem. We have made significant progress on a lot of our services… We've seen partners making a lot of money and enjoying it."