The company is actively recruiting channel both for Epicor 9 and its retail products under Craig McCollum and it will spread the channel program to other product areas such as the recently purchased SolarSoft. Bauer developed fairly standard features that Epicor had lacked for its channel. These include sales quotas and updated program documentation. Bauer reinstituted a category of solutions providers, which are not resellers but organizations such as systems integrators that do everything but sell and own the customer relationship and services partners that are primarily systems integrators and subcontractors, who do not own the customer.  He also established a referral program via which firms can earn margin or have rewards as rebates that endusers can use to reduce the cost of Epicor products. Bauer also said rating of VARs has gone from total reliance on sales to about 60 percent sales, along with points for referenceable customers and use of Net Promoter scores to rank partner performance. Most training programs are now available remotely and Bauer said their cost has been reduced by 70 percent.