I wish Oracle would take notes...
Oracle are taking Sun hardware deals direct at the moment in our experience.....whilst they have introduced a rebates program, you can not register any deals as they are all rejected as 'known opportunities' which means Oracle can take the deal direct 'when the customer chooses' and not have to pay a unhook fee to the Partner.
Normally at the time 'when the customer chooses' to go direct with Oracle they have been given a Oracle quote at a price cheaper than the channel can buy.
Surprisingly when you ask Oracle about how they knew about the opportunity they normally say 'you shared us the info a while ago' or Oracle Tele-Sales have randomly rung the customer and it has got to the point where Oracle Channel Managers are telling the Partners to not tell anybody in Oracle about the opportunity until you have registered it.
We have taken that advice and go sell HP and IBM.