I’m Chris Buckel. I work with ISVs on hyperscaler GTM – cloud alliances, co-sell and marketplace – and on how agentic AI is reshaping that motion.
flashdba began in 2012 as a way to explore what flash storage would mean for traditional database systems. What started as a technical curiosity became a long-running examination of how shifts in infrastructure reshape the way organisations build, operate and scale technology. Disk to flash reset performance expectations. On-premises to cloud reset deployment models. Dashboards to AI-driven inference is now resetting how organisations consume and act on information. That progression is the through-line for the Databases in the Age of AI series.
Drawing on fifteen years in enterprise technology GTM, I wrote what I believe is the most complete practitioner guide available on the subject: The Hyperscaler GTM Playbook. It covers cloud alliances, co-sell and cloud marketplace in depth – not as vendor marketing, but as a working guide for the people who have to build and run these motions: alliance leaders, GTM executives and the founders and CROs trying to understand what they are funding.
My background here is hands-on. I built hyperscaler co-sell from zero at Kaminario and Silk, developing senior relationships across AWS, Microsoft and Google Cloud. I understand the mechanics of ACE and Partner Center, the economics of committed-spend drawdown, and the organisational gap most ISVs fall into between their first co-sell win and a repeatable motion.
I now work with ISVs directly – on alliance strategy, co-sell execution and marketplace, and on the question I think matters most right now: AI is commoditising the mechanical layer of the co-sell motion, while the judgment and narrative layer becomes more valuable, not less. Engagements range from project work to ongoing advisory to fractional alliance leadership.
If any of that is relevant to what you’re building, you can reach me on LinkedIn or by email at flashdba @ gmail.
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