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Becoming a partner
How the hardware channel is entered — what distributors, resellers and dealers actually are, and the paperwork every program asks for.
Distributor vs reseller vs dealer
In two-tier IT and electronics distribution, a distributor is a wholesaler: it buys in volume, warehouses stock, extends credit, and sells to the trade rather than to end customers. In industrial and power equipment the same word means something else — there a distributor is the manufacturer's regional sales and service organization, and it does sell end users directly. A reseller (or solution provider) sells to end customers and usually holds no stock at all; a dealer is the franchise-like middle case, with an assigned territory, a service obligation, and a required parts inventory. Nearly everyone searching "how to become a distributor" is describing the reseller role.
Read →How to Become an NVIDIA Partner
The NVIDIA Partner Network (NPN) is NVIDIA's channel program: it sorts companies into partner types, recognizes expertise through competencies, and ranks commitment through tiers. There is no advertised fee to enroll, and new members normally start at the entry tier where the partner type has one. Critically, the badge is not a way to buy — it governs deal registration, margin, co-marketing and allocation priority on top of a separate distributor account, which is what actually lets a company order product.
Read →What is a resale certificate?
A resale certificate is a document a buyer gives a seller stating that the goods are being bought to resell, not to use — so the seller does not charge sales tax on that purchase. The tax is not waived; it moves to the final sale, which the reseller is then responsible for collecting. Certificates are issued per US state, not federally, and they depend on a separate sales-tax registration (often called a seller’s permit) that most buyers confuse them with.
Read →What is a D-U-N-S Number?
A D-U-N-S Number is a nine-digit identifier issued by Dun & Bradstreet — a private data company — that keys your business credit file. It is free to request and still widely asked for by lenders, distributors, and corporate suppliers. It is not a government ID: since April 4, 2022, US federal registration uses the SAM.gov Unique Entity ID (UEI) instead.
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