Comms Dealer

Distributor ScanSource has expanded its sales team and launched a new reseller programme.

The company has recruited new sales and pre-sales staff and promoted former account managers Mike Greenwood and Adam Parker to Sales Manager roles reporting to UK Sales Director Kim Jennings.

In tandem with the management restructure ScanSource has rolled out its new FastPath partner enablement programme, giving resellers access to tools and schemes from a variety of manufacturer partners, including FastPath to iConnect for Avaya.

ScanSource specialists will also guide resellers through a vendor's authorisation and certification processes.

"As we look to help our reseller partners grow their business, we are also committed to delivering the programmes and support they need to be successful," said Rudy De Meirsman, MD, ScanSource Communications, Europe. "This means investing in our people to deliver enhanced pre- and post-sale support."

Nimans has expanded its product range from long range wireless technology firm EnGenius with a wireless networking portfolio including indoor and outdoor long range Wi-Fi access points.

These include a smoke detector style ceiling mounted device that expands the overall user capacity of a network especially when transferring bandwidth intensive files.

Another innovation is a long range 2.4 GHz wireless outdoor access point that provides Internet connectivity for restaurants, educational and corporate sites.

"It's been another year of great collaboration between Nimans and EnGenius Europe," said Andy Winfield, Purchasing Director at Nimans.

"The latest network devices represent an exciting new chapter in our ever-closer partnership."

Six Degrees Group (6DG) has expanded its Datahop Network with the addition of a London PoP at Volta Data Centres, the provider of data centres to the financial, media and content industries.

The 6DG core network of data centre locations, virtualised servers and network operators offers a fully integrated range of cloud hosting, managed data services, data centre, connectivity and voice services.

The addition of a PoP at Volta's facility will provide 6DG customers with further choice when building their business architecture.

Volta's Great Sutton Street Data Centre is Central London's first new data centre for more than a decade, catering to the requirements of latency-sensitive users in the financial services industry, TechCity-based technology firms and the media industry.

The combination of Volta's 33kV diverse power supply and range of Tier 1 carriers bringing their own diverse fibre connectivity to the building makes Volta the most resilient facility in central London, claims the firm.

Campbell Williams, Group Strategy & Marketing Director, 6DG, said: "Our partnership with Volta marks a significant step in managed services. Our network infrastructure will enable Volta to offer the capacity, bandwidth resilience and reach of the 6DG network to its customers, and will be a welcome addition to our PoPs network in London."

Matthew Dent, CEO of Volta commented: "Our partnership benefits the interconnected and ever more digital world we live in and improves both the physical and cloud based infrastructure for doing business in central London."

Colt has joined the METRO2C Alliance, a collaboration of European connectivity providers, data centre operators and Internet exchanges.

Colt's membership adds a 22 country-wide European network to the alliance, delivering customers direct fibre connections to 19,800 buildings and Colt's 20 carrier neutral data centres.

Diane Hodnett, CEO of METRO2C's founder Sea Fibre Networks, said: "Collaborating with Colt gives customers access to a portfolio of business communication services including application, cloud and content delivery to 41 major European cities.

"Colt's membership underscores the METRO2C Alliance's strategy of working with connectivity providers and data centre operators to support the growing data demands of enterprises and consumers."

Ken Sherry, Country Manager, Ireland, at Colt said: "Through the METRO2C Alliance, Colt continues to expand access to its integrated network and IT services portfolio.

"Members and enterprises will benefit from access to Colt's information delivery platform, combining network and IT infrastructure with expertise in IT managed services, networking and communication solutions to help grow revenues."

As businesses turn to the Internet of Things for growth, M2M WAN connections are set to triple by 2018, says market research firm Infonetics Research.

"M2M continues to gather momentum as enterprises, in the never-ending pursuit of competitive advantage, seek to find new ways of using connected technologies to improve business agility and lower operational costs," said Godfrey Chua, directing analyst for M2M and The Internet of Things at Infonetics Research.

C"For service providers, there are significant and fast growing opportunities ahead. Specifically, cellular technologies are playing an increasingly important role in enabling M2M services, comprising the vast majority of WAN wireless M2M connections today, over 220 million, and nearly tripling to just over 630 million connections by 2018.

"Among the cellular generations, 2G and 3G are the majority currently, but it's LTE that will grow the fastest, starting from a small base and then expanding rapidly, supported by efforts like AT&T/GM/OnStar and other connected car initiatives, as well as China Mobile's massive LTE TDD network rollout."

The global market for M2M services reached just over $16 billion in 2013, and there were nearly 1.7 billion M2M connections worldwide, the report says, with a growing list of global tier 1 players supporting more than 10 million M2M connections each

M2M access services-where operators' broadband services function as M2M access solutions-make up over 16% of M2M service revenue, around $3bn.

Global revenue from M2M services is forecast by Infonetics to grow at an 18% CAGR from 2013 to 2018.

For technology vendors, it is increasingly important to build networking solutions that take into consideration the architectural requirements of the various M2M use cases that are proliferating, as well as the portfolio of emerging connection technologies, stated the report authors.

Although revenue growth rates for comms service providers (CSPs) is set to remain modest CSPs will continue to invest heavily in their networks, according to Ovum.

With global CSP capital expenditures (capex) forecasted to total more than $2.1tn from 2014-19, the global analyst firm warns CSPs must continue to do less with more, leveraging new technologies, network designs, vendors, and operating models.

In a new report Ovum states 2019 capex is projected to be $367bn, yet vendors face a tougher marketplace as spending is being pressured by modest revenue outlooks as growth remains weak for most carriers, particularly fixed carriers.

Also, says the research house, the rise of more software- and IT-centric opportunities, driven by the emergence of SDN (software-defined networking) and network function virtualisation (NFV), means traditional telecom vendors will come up against a different set of vendors going after CSPs' network budget dollars.

Yet, with a diverse array of digital media companies now spending heavily on CSP-grade network infrastructure, vendor-addressable capex could increase by $50bn or more in 2019, presenting a promising upside for vendors selling network infrastructure.

Report author and principal network infrastructure analyst Matt Walker said: "The telecom world is changing. Established market boundaries are falling by the wayside. Competition is tougher, service innovation is faster, and margins are often slimmer. Value (and profits) is shifting among industry segments.

"There are two things to remember in all of this. First, most of this change is great for the consumer. Users are capturing enormous benefits from the technology investments and new business models of CSPs and adjacent market players.

"Second, there are upsides to this industry change for vendors. Despite flattish CSP capex, there is a new sector of companies building network infrastructure, partially offsetting the CSP weakness. To profit from this digital media growth, though, vendors will need strengths in both telecom/hardware and IT/software, and learn to serve this new customer type."

Elsewhere, the analysis reveals three different country markets make up 45% of expected CSP 2014-19 capex: the US, China, and Japan.

"The competitive landscape of CSPs differs starkly across these markets, as do regulations, demographics, local vendors, and even technology standards. These markets are expensive to address, requiring significant local investment (eg, R&D facilities) for non-local companies," added Walker.

"The remainder of the top 15 market list includes countries from all major regions: Brazil, Russia, UK, Canada, Germany, India, Italy, France, Australia, Korea, Spain, and Mexico. Beyond the top 15, capex is broadly distributed among a long tail of smaller country markets, from Argentina (0.7% of 2014-19 capex) to Thailand (0.8%) and beyond.

Version 3B of the Red Box Quantify Recording Suite has achieved Mitel-Approved Test (MAT) Recertification with Mitel MiVoice Business unified communications software.

"This interoperability certification is recognition from Mitel that Red Box retains its status as MSA Gold Preferred partner," stated Lee Jones, CEO of Red Box Recorders.

"This achievement is the most recent highlight of many years of successful partnership between Mitel and Red Box, whose telephony and voice recording solutions are deployed by thousands of businesses around the world."

David Lowenstein, Director of Business Development for Mitel Solutions Alliance, added: "Building and maintaining the right technology relationships to deliver customers high value integrated solutions is a critical component of success in the current business communications marketplace."

Unify has appointed Norm Korey to lead the company's Latin American Region (LAM), replacing Humberto Cagno, whose planned retirement is effective on June 30, 2014.

"Latin America represents a market of continued growth opportunity for Unify," said Dean Douglas, CEO of Unify. "I'm confident that Norm's experience not only prepares him well to lead the LAM region, it also will enable him to be a key contributor as we transition Unify into software and services."

Korey boasts leadership experience with global brands including IBM, AT&T and Motorola. 

For the past four years he led an IBM Global Services initiative incubating the SmartCloud software-as-a-service offering for the enterprise marketplace. 

Previously, he managed software and services businesses in the mobility and wireless sectors across various international markets.

"I'm very pleased to be joining Unify at this important period in the company's history, building upon the momentum we have in the Latin America market and benefiting from the increased visibility of the new Unify brand both regionally and globally," said Korey. 

"Latin America's economies continue to expand through technology investments, and this region will be an important growth engine for the business."

Nine Wholesale sponsored racing driver Josh Webster has been selected as the Porsche Carrera Cup GB Scholarship winner for 2014/15, joining Redline Racing, the most successful team in Carrera Cup GB history.

The Porsche Carrera Cup GB is a major support race to the MSA British Touring Car Championship (BTCC).

Nine Wholesale have sponsored Webster since the early days of his career. James Palmer, CEO at Nine, said: "Josh is an incredible example of how dedicating yourself to a passion, listening to the knowledge of the people who advise you and committing to be the best can pay off.

"He puts in an enormous amount of effort and it's a privilege to be so involved in his career. I personally try to clear the diary to support Josh at every race, and we're thrilled to offer our Purple Partners the chance to come along as well.

"It's a great day out and Josh is always happy to show the behind the scenes action. Josh is once again racing with our distinctive purple and white livery which looks superb on the track."

In a bid to drive channel growth Dell is offering more rebates to push software sales.

Dell's Enterprise Forum in Frankfurt heard about a series of new programs and incentives to push channel business, including expansion of Dell Financial Services, Dell ProSupport Plus and more access to Dell equipment.

Still aiming at a simplified go-to-market model with end-to-end support for the customer, the next step in its plans is growing and strengthening EMEA channel business at above industry average rates.

The channel is encouraged to sell more from the Dell portfolio of PowerEdge servers, storage, networking, software, thin client, workstations and Dell SecureWorks. The company will offer partners expanded rebates for multiple products sold in one deal.

Deal Registration will continue to allow partners to identify all direct opportunities with end customers. Channel partners will also benefit from leads provided by Dell, "encouraging a channel-led approach for specifically targeted end customers that would benefit from channel partner involvement". This will enable partners to identify and target specific companies with the assurance that Dell will not pro-actively pursue such leads, although end customers still have the choice of buying directly from Dell or through a partner.

Dell Premier Partners in EMEA will have the opportunity to claim a two percent rebate on software sales in earned competencies.

The offer will apply to sales of solutions within the four software competencies: security, information management, data protection, and systems management.