Category: Moving People

Kenna Security wants Crompton to spruce up its channel

Posted on October 17, 2017 by - Moving People, News

trevorcromptonCybersecurity outfit Kenna Security has hired Trevor Crompton to build it a shiny new channel of UK sales partners.

Crompton has history with Symantec and RiskIQ.  In RiskIQ he managed to keep 60 resellers, 20 consultants and 10 systems integrators across EMEA happy. Crompton used Obscure Technologies in Africa and Ignition Technologies in the UK.

Crompton has promised the Kenna channel will be 100 percent channel across EMEA. At RiskIQ Crompton he redirected all direct business through resellers.

Market analyst Gartner expects security spending to grow from $28.7 billion across EMEA now to $36.9 billion by 2021. The EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will drive 65 percent of those buying decisions as companies desperately try to plug data leaks.

Right now, most security bosses don’t know where to start to defend their businesses and Kenna’s partners can solve this problem by managing the risk. Its system reads vulnerability data, compares it to exploit data and calculates the risk score before create a fix priority list.

 

Canalys thinks that things are getting very indirect

Posted on October 9, 2017 by - Moving People, News

directListening to Canalys CEO Steve Brazier bang on in Venice you can’t help but think that the direct model is going to die a death.

Talking to the annual conference over cheese on a stick and drinkies Brazier said that channel partners are doing well and the European economy is looking better that it has done for the last ten years.

He said that there were more opportunities for the channel now than there have ever been.

This year, over the first half, distributors grew 4 to 5 percent and channel partners improved by seven percent on average.

Brazier, at the Channels Forum event, spoke of the way vertical markets, from retail, transport, health and public sector, were all “embracing” digital technology and using the channel to roll out those services.

The move towards edge computing is also driving a lot of growth and Brazier expected a growth in ‘micro clouds’ as resellers provided services closer to user data and applications.

There was also a mention of security, with that segment enjoying the strongest growth as a result of the increasing threats and factors like GDPR driving spending across Europe.

However the wholesale move towards becoming a predominately software and services business is probably going to be as grim as the life expectancy of a wedding guest in the Game of Thrones.

“This has been the year where the vendors have been preaching digital transformation to you. They are not only trying to talk to you about selling more stuff, they are trying to battle for your thought leadership in where you will take your thoughts forwards,” Brazier said.

“I’m sure you have been told you need to change the way you engage with customers and invest more in digital marketing and retrain your sales force,” he added.

Brazier warned that listening to the vendors, which had their own agendas, could undermine the future strategy.

“Should a partner that’s reselling infrastructure, PCs and software should they change? Probably yes,” he said.

Canalys is predicting that hardware will still contribute over 50 percent of revenues for 90 percent of partners in 2020.

“Whoever told you selling hardware was dead is completely wrong. The PC is suddenly the most profitable part of your business again”, said Brazier.

Exertis names Rik Hubbard commercial and services director

Posted on August 10, 2017 by - Moving People, News

Rik_HubbardExertis has announced the appointment of Rik Hubbard as its mobile commercial and services director.

Hubbard will be working with the sales and purchasing teams to boost the performance of the division’s market leading vendors across the consumer and business to business areas.

He also has to build on the opportunity to launch a range of device-focused services from trade-in, repair and refurbishment to finance and service contracts, following the recent announcement of the MTR Group acquisition.

Hubbard will report to Exertis mobile director Simon Woodman, who said: “Rik is joining our team at an exciting time for the mobile division. He brings a wealth of experience having worked for a major vendor and a leading telco and internet service provider.

“We have opportunities to grow in the main areas of our business with a superb portfolio of products and solutions to offer our customers. We are now also in an excellent position to enhance our entanglement still further with our vendor partners and clients by providing additional services to support their business. Rik will play a fundamental role in helping us to achieve that.”

Hubbard is a chartered accountant with almost twenty years’ experience in the telco industry, and joins from Samsung where he was head of commercial finance and financial services for five years.

When he was there he helped launch the S7 Upgrade programme which was the UK’s first manufacturer backed handset upgrade scheme. Before that, he spent a similar period at Three in a variety of commercial roles.

Hubbard was very positive on his appointment, saying: “Providing services that add value are fundamental to being successful in technology distribution. I am delighted to have joined Exertis, a company at the forefront of mobile distribution with an outstanding product and solutions portfolio, and one with the drive and ambition to look for and add complementary services that make a positive contribution to revenue and profit for partners and customers. I look forward to building on this success and working with a vibrant, award-winning team.”

 

Singleton signs up for Advice Cloud

Posted on August 4, 2017 by - Moving People, News

YLGTGI1IFormer G-cloud boss Tony Singleton, OBE, has signed up to public sector procurement outfit Advice Cloud as a strategic advisor.

Singleton was the chap who oversaw the launch of the Government’s Digital Marketplace and was G-Cloud director for a two-year period to March 2016.

He took up a COO role in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy but has left the public service and headed into consultancy.

His Advice Cloud work involves helping SME suppliers gain access to government organisations and working with Advice Cloud gives him the opportunity to work with those suppliers, helping them to make the most of the opportunities open to them.

Advice Cloud managing director Chris Farthing said: “I am incredibly excited and humbled to have a person of Tony’s calibre join the team. He will bring an unrivalled wealth of experience and knowledge to us here as well as assisting us and our ambitious SME clients deliver better public services.”

Perhaps Farthing could have been slightly more effusive.

ThetaRay launches in London

Posted on August 3, 2017 by - Moving People, News

AAEAAQAAAAAAAARkAAAAJDM5ZTA1NWEyLTFmOTgtNDcyZC05ZGVmLTcxMWM0ZWFmMzdiMwThetaRay, a provider of big data analytics solutions for financial institutions and manufacturers, today announced that it has opened its first UK office in London.

It will be led by Richard Biss, who comes to ThetaRay with more than twenty years of industry experience. Biss said:

“ThetaRay is poised to totally disrupt the financial services security industry; their proprietary solutions solve challenges that I’ve encountered throughout my entire career. I’m honoured to help expand the company’s presence and customer base in the UK financial services market.”

Biss previously served as director for a number of anomaly detection service providers. Prior to that, he spent 17 years at Sybase, where he was Director of UK Financial Services. When Sybase was acquired by SAP in 2010, Biss stayed on as Director of Financial Services, Databases, and Technology.

The UK office is the latest in a steady stream of company milestones for ThetaRay.  In the past year, the company has doubled the size of its workforce, bringing on executives such as NICE Systems veteran James Heinzman and others from HP and PayPal. It has also completed installations with several leading US retail banks and large European banking institutions.

“As our track record shows, we are dedicated to protecting financial institutions against fraud, money laundering and other operational threats,” stated ThetaRay CEO Mark Gazit. “We are excited that Richard will be leading these efforts in one of the world’s key finance centers. His extensive experience with both financial services and anomaly detection technology makes him the ideal candidate to help ThetaRay expand its UK footprint.”

ThetaRay’s technology enables financial institutions to uncover the earliest signs of illicit behavior and threats, including multichannel fraud, money laundering, and ATM security breaches. The company’s patented mathematical algorithms can process tens of thousands of parameters simultaneously, helping to automatically identify unknown threats across multiple environments, systems and sources in real-time.

Tony Brooker becomes XMA’s UK corporate sales director

Posted on August 3, 2017 by - Moving People, News

TonyBrooker-580x358XMA has appointed former Insight and Misco vice president Tony Brooker as its new UK corporate sales director.

Brooker left Misco in February and will be a key part of  XMA’s moves to bolster its corporate sector business as it tried to expand beyond its traditional public sector clients.

Before working for Misco Brooker worked for Insight,  then SCC and then back to Insight.

XMA has always been renowned in the public sector, mostly in education. However it has been quietly developing its corporate space profile and the plan is to grow that in the next six to 12 months across the four locations.

XMA’s corporate team currently accounts for just over 20 percent of XMA’s total business, according to sales and marketing director Ian Cunningham, who harbours ambitions to have a 50/50 profit split between public and private business in three years’ time.

Brooker said the size of the corporate team will be expanded, but it is unclear if the team will be dispersed across the reseller’s offices in Glasgow, Halifax, Nottingham and St Albans – or based in one location. He also didn’t rule out opening “a fifth or sixth” office down the line.

XMA also recently head-hunted Andy Wright from SCC and Kelvin Lee from the Crown Commercial Service,

In its most recent financial report XMA recorded a year-on-year revenue jump of 52.6 percent for the 12 months ending 31 December 2016, up to £358.5 million.

Inoapps appoints Rule and Blackburn

Posted on July 7, 2017 by - Moving People

inoappsGlobal Oracle Platinum Partner Inoapps has named Ally Rule as CFO and Mike Blackburn as UK VP of Sales.

In his new role as CFO, Rule is responsible for managing the Group’s financial risks and helping shape strategic and continued global growth, capitalising on the growing worldwide demand for Oracle solutions.

Prior to joining Inoapps, Ally Rule was CFO of Aberdeen based Proserv, a global technology driven oilfield services group. Prior to this, he was a partner with EY, having worked in their Aberdeen, Auckland, London and Edinburgh offices, specialising in corporate acquisitions, disposals and IPOs.

Joining as UK VP of Sales, Mike Blackburn has to come up with a new expansive UK sales strategy. Prior to joining Inoapps, Mike was Sales and Marketing Director at AdviserPlus, the UK’s leading provider of managed HR advisory solutions. He has also held board level sales positions in the technology sector, with MHR and NGA HR.

Inoapps CEO Andy Bird said: “We’re investing heavily in building the right management team to drive the global success that Inoapps is enjoying across EMEA, USA and the ASEAN territories. I am confident that these appointments will further strengthen the winning senior team that we have in place.

“Ally’s impressive background in global corporate finance, working for a $500m revenue company and as a partner at EY, makes him a great fit for his new role. He will be instrumental in providing the financial vision and leadership required to take Inoapps to the next level in its evolution.

“Mike is a proven sales and marketing professional with over twenty-five years’ global success as a sales leader, company director and board member. He brings a wealth of experience in sales strategy and management, and his record of success in the technology sector will be a valuable asset to the company.”

Opsgility doubles in Dublin

Posted on July 4, 2017 by - Moving People, News

Ominous Clouds over Dublin CityMicrosoft cloud expert Opsgility has opened a new subsidiary office located in Dublin, Ireland.

Dr. Jonathan Tuliani has been appointed as the Managing Director of this new office, effective July 1. Tuliani will report to Michael Washam, CEO, and will oversee the rapidly expanding European market.

Tuliani comes to Opsgility after spending more than nine years at Microsoft, most recently serving as the Principal Program Manager on the Azure Networking Team. As part of a global team, he led the development of multiple Microsoft Azure services, including Azure DNS and Azure Traffic Manager.

“Not only are we excited to be opening this new office, we’re also thrilled to bring such a strong technical leader to Opsgility,” said Michael Washam, CEO of Opsgility. “The cloud readiness market is rapidly growing, and this new office, paired with Jonathan’s skillset, presents us the opportunity to better service our global clients.”

He said: “This new role will allow me to act as a bridge between Microsoft’s Cloud technology and Opsgility’s breadth of customers. I was drawn to the direct line between the work Opsgility does and the value that’s delivered to their customers. While Opsgility is a small team, they have seen tremendous growth over the past several years, and they are a powerhouse when it comes to Microsoft training. I am excited to be a part of this fast-growing company and eager to see where we go over the next several years.”

Prior to Microsoft, Tuliani was the Technical Director at Cryptomathic Limited, a specialist security software vendor. Reporting directly to the CEO, he was responsible for all UK technical activities. Tuliani earned his Ph.D. in Mathematics from the University of London and serves on the board of The Children’s House, a local school in Dublin.

Channel-only jobs website launched

Posted on July 4, 2017 by - Moving People, News

1200px-Unemployed_men_queued_outside_a_depression_soup_kitchen_opened_in_Chicago_by_Al_Capone,_02-1931_-_NARA_-_541927Channelpeople.co.uk which is being touted as a website  for job hunters searching for jobs specifically among  IT vendors, distributors, resellers and MSPs has launched.

Co-founder Gavin O’Shea said 15 clients, who are being offered a free trial until September, have signed up in its launch week, .

O’Shea said he hoped to have 100 clients posting jobs on the site within a year, and 500 in the longer term.

Many firms prefer to keep recruitment in-house but have also concluded that generalist jobs sites do not address the specifics of the channel, he said.

The site uses industry-specific search filters designed to help IT channel professionals easily find vacancies that are relevant to them.

Both O’Shea and his Channelpeople.co.uk co-founder Leon Conway have spent the majority of their careers in IT distribution.  O’Shea was most recently a general manager at Exertis.

They said that there are between 6,000 and 10,000 active resellers buying through distribution every month. Then there are probably 1,000 or more vendors in the UK.

“We don’t think 100 clients in the first year is a lot. It would be lovely to get to 500 – that’s really what we’re aiming for long term.”

Carbon Black poaches channel bloke from HPE

Posted on May 12, 2017 by - Moving People, News

milesripponclearswift-370x229Miles Rippon has been named as Carbon Black’s EMEA channel director and has been ordered to sort out the outfit ‘s European channel business following its strategic distribution agreement with Arrow.

Apparently, Rippon will be building up Carbon Black’s relationships with channel partners, expanding its reach and increasing enterprise sales through the region. To do this he will have to push Arrow and Carbon Black’s joint offerings in cyber security.
In a statement, Rippon pointed out that traditional AV products were going no-where because they could not deliver the improvements needed to protect organisations against modern threats.

While there is a huge demand from customers for a leading NGAV solution, by combining Cb Defense with Arrow’s vast network, Carbon Black is greatly increasing its global footprint, providing high margins for resellers and continuing to stay at the cutting edge keeping businesses protected from cyberattacks, he said.

There is a huge opportunity for Carbon Black to work with its channel partners to grow its market share this year and Rippon said was happy to be behind the wheel.

Rippon joins Carbon Black from HPE’s enterprise security products division, where he served as EMEA channel and alliance director. Prior to that, he has held roles as VP of global channels for Clearswift and VP of EMEA channels for RSA Security.

Mark Reeves, VP for EMEA sales at Carbon Black, said: “Miles is an EMEA channel expert with extensive experience and hands-on sales territory and sales management skills. He has maintained strong sales performance records in developed and emerging territories. With the recent launch of our streaming prevention technology and the appointment of Arrow, we are now well set up to service the channel and build momentum in the market.”

PCM enters the UK and is hiring

Posted on April 28, 2017 by - Moving People, News

XdyfrZEwPCM has unveiled its entry into the United Kingdom and Europe through a wholly-owned subsidiary, PCM Technology Solutions UK.

For those who came in late, PCM is a big US technology solutions provider with 2016 revenues of $2.25 billion and nearly 4,000 employees.

Opening in the UK is the next major step in PCM’s global expansion following its successful entry into Canada in 2015. PCM UK will be conducting a Grand Opening celebration on 2 May and expects to begin sales operations during the second quarter.

PCM UK is driving towards considerable scale and expects to employ 90 co-workers by the end of 2017.

PCM CEO Frank Khulusi, Chairman said that the outfit’s expansion into the UK marks a major milestone for PCM.

“PCM UK will be our hub for the UK and the rest of Europe.  Many of our North American customers are increasingly global with needs for us to deliver to their European operations cutting-edge IT solutions with the same high level of service they have grown accustomed to from us in North America.”

The outfit said that there are significant potential opportunities for customers based in the UK and across the European Union.

“We believe now is the right timing for us to pursue this additional market, and launched our UK operations accordingly. We spent a great deal of time during the quarter setting up the operation, hiring a managing director and various other leadership roles to ensure the success of this international expansion.”

PCM UK has recently appointed Donavan Hutchinson as its Managing Director. Hutchinson joined the PCM in February to help develop and create the UK operation.

Hutchinson worked for other Global IT solution providers where he was directly responsible for creating and effectively executing collaboration programs to extend service offerings from North America based clients into the UK, Europe and Asia Pacific Markets.

Hutchinson, stated, “I am excited to bring my experience and record of accomplishment of successfully growing global sales of IT solutions to the PCM family.  With a mission of delivering a very high level of service to our European clients, we have already built an incredible management team to lead the operation, and I’m confident we will be able to expand the successes of PCM to the UK and across Europe. “

Jay Miley, PCM’s President, added: “Our success in rapidly building the UK operation and preparing it for a grand launch has been one of leveraging our strong relationships with our key vendors and distribution partners who believe in our team and our strategic business plan. I would like to personally thank all of our internal stakeholders, partners, vendors and distributors who are assisting us in executing against our strategy to extend the high level of service and support that our customers currently enjoy today.”

PCM UK is now hiring for positions in sales, vendor management, purchasing, marketing, IT and finance as well as a variety of other business roles.

Microsoft’s partner boss promoted

Posted on January 13, 2017 by - Moving People, News

maxresdefault (4)Microsoft’s UK partner boss Clare Barclay has been promoted to the role of UK chief operating officer.

According to a company email Barclay announced that she is “transitioning” into the role of UK COO and would report to UK CEO Cindy Rose. The reporting is unchanged she already does that in her current job of small and mid-market Solutions and Partners general manager.

Chris Perkins taking on interim leadership of the SMS&P business from 1 February until they can find a successor. He has led Microsoft’s corporate accounts business for the last four years and is a “great supporter” of selling with partners, Barclay said.

She added that she will continue to fly the flag for partners in her new role.

“I have always been and continue to be a passionate advocate for our partner community and will continue to stay connected in my new capacity. During my tenure, I’ve been supported by an incredibly strong leadership team, who remain in place to help you grow your business alongside Microsoft and you should not see any changes day to day as a result of this announcement.”

Vole announced plans to rejig its partner business last week, merging SMS&P and its Enterprise Product Group. However there were not supposed to be any management reshuffles as a result of the move.

Barclay said that it was an incredible time in the industry and one that is full of opportunity but also change.

“New year is often a time to reflect and it has been incredible to see the impact we have had together with our partners over the last couple of years, as we have helped our customers transform their businesses and have seen rapid adoption of cloud services during this time. I have had the pleasure of leading the SMS&P and partner business over this period and I wanted to thank you for the impact you have had,” he said.

Markus Haas is Telefonica Deutschland’s new supremo

Posted on December 12, 2016 by - Moving People, News

markus-haasTelefonica Deutschland has appointed Markus Haas to replace its supreme dalek Thorsten Dirks who announced in November he was exiting the telecoms firm.

Haas, 44, a lawyer who has been with the company since 1998 and is chief operating officer is under orders to lead the telecoms company in close cooperation with finance chief Rachel Empey.

Haas was appointed to the executive board and since 2012 he was a member of the board of directors of Telefónica Deutschland Holding in 2009, where he most recently steered the company strategy.

The successful acquisition of E-Plus group was one of his moves as was the acquisition and integration of HanseNet, the LTE spectrum auction and Telefónica Deutschland´s successful IPO.

He also negotiated the commercially important strategic partnerships with Deutsche Telekom, Versatel and most recently Drillischamong others.

Markus Haas started his career in the legal affairs and regulatory division at Telefónica in Germany in 1998 -at that time Viag Interkom -and subsequently worked as Executive Assistant of the CFO.

Afterwards, he steered as Vice President the Corporate & Legal Affairs department with commercial responsibility for the roaming-and wholesale network-business.

Telefonica, which is controlled by Spain’s Telefonica, said Haas would start his new role on 1 January with a three-year contract.
Dirks will be supporting the new leadership during the first three months of 2017. Dirks, who has been at the helm since October 2014, said at the end of November that he was leaving to pursue new challenges.

Sarah Shields is Dell EMC’s channel queen

Posted on December 1, 2016 by - Moving People, News

sarah-shields-new-620x350Dell EMC has confirmed that Sarah Shields has the top job running its UK and Ireland channel.

Shields ran the local channel for Dell and was facing off against Kevin Sparks her EMC counterpart. It is not clear what his role will now be in the glorious new empire. Dell says it will be making any announcement about his role in the future. We hope he does not get special projects, with an office in the lift.

She officially takes control in February and will head up a new Dell EMC partner programme. Of course, Dell says that its new cunning plan was built in “collaboration” with its “partners” that sell its stuff.

Dell EMEA channel overlord, Michael Collins claimed that resellers, integrators and distributors had seen “significant [sales] growth” under Shields over the past 19 months.

Shields joined Dell, from Gateway in 2008 and has run the consumer, online, SMB and enterprise channels. Before Gateway, where she was as European sales director she had been a business manager at Acer and channel manager at AMD.

Dell spruces up its channel with EMC blood

Posted on October 18, 2016 by - Moving People, News

Michael DellDell has named its new channel and sales executives and appears to be leaning on EMC bigwigs to improve its channel.

EMC channel chief Gregg Ambulos is now in charge of the North American channel, after EMC’s John Byrne was made global channel supremo in July.

Ambulos reports to Byrne, and his appointment came along with a host of other executive moves designed to streamline and unify the Dell Technologies sales and channel operations.

Byrne, who worked for AMD, is now the president of global channels and reports directly to Marius Haas, Dell COO and president of commercial solutions.

This looks like Dell intends to lean heavily on EMC’s channel expertise and moving towards partner-led customer engagements, similar to EMC’s programme.

Jim DeFoe is now the head of global distribution. DeFoe is a 20-year Dell veteran, and has spent almost all that time as vice president of global sales channels and programmes.

Cheryl Cook is now the head of partner marketing, reporting to Nina Hargus, senior vice president of global field marketing. Cook was the face of Dell’s channel operation after coming from Sun.

Kimberley DeLeon, another former AMD bod, was hired by Dell last January. She will be the head of global channel programmes at Dell Technologies,.

Randy Huey, also from Dell is now the head of channel strategy, Huey will lead channel strategy and planning. He and Byrne will map out plans for partner spending and coverage across Dell and EMC.

Pilar Schenk will be head of channel sales planning and operations.

Tian Beng Ng will be the head of Asia-Pacific and Japan channel sales. He has been with Dell 17 years, most recently as vice president and managing director, South Asia and Korea. Alvaro Camarena  is now the head of Latin America channel sales. Camarena has been with Dell eight years as executive director of Latin America channel programmess. Michael Collins will head Dell’s EMEA channel sales operation. The 14-year Dell veteran was most recently vice president of strategy and channel, EMEA.