Comms Dealer

Canalys has named Softcat as 2013's top revenue growth partner in EMEA at this year's Canalys Channel Forum Awards.

Softcat chairman Martin Hellawell accepted the Canalys 'Revenue Growth Partner of the Year' award at a packed ceremony held at the Hotel Arts Barcelona.

Softcat announced 30% growth this financial year, following a three-year growth stint that has seen its revenues grow from £146m to £400m. It has won multiple partner awards and accreditations as a result of its revenue growth and partnership investments, just this week announcing HP's Platinum Partner status, and Red Hat's 'stronger Together' award.

Hellawell said: "Most of our awards tend to be UK-based, so it's humbling to have been nominated for an EMEA award, never mind win it. Due to our size and relative 'youth' we're still regarded as an up-and-coming player, which makes attaining this award even more of an achievement.

"The business environment has been challenging over the past few years and many of our competitors struggled to achieve significant growth last year. Winning this award is a testament to the hard work of our brilliant staff, who remain incredibly driven to provide great customer service, and committed to helping the company grow. We're privileged to work with so many great customers, and of course our relationships with our partners have contributed hugely to our growth."

Last year Softcat won the EMEA channel partner of the year at the same event. The Canalys Forum is an annual event that recognises vendors, resellers and other partners in the IT industry for their successes in the channel.

Cloud and SaaS specialist to the channel intY has confirmed two significant new sign-ups to its intY CASCADE cloud provisioning platform.

Eclipse and alwaysON now line up alongside other CASCADE users including Cisco, Symantec and Microsoft, as well as many ISVs.

The addition of Eclipse to the co-operative-style marketplace will provide partners with high end business class Internet services that ensure the end user experience for cloud solutions.

alwaysOn will offer Microsoft Lync 2013 as a hosted application delivered over its resilient private MPLS network.

As part of CASCADE, partners and resellers will be able to sell and provision alwaysOn on its own or as part of their service bundles for end user organsations.

Chris Baldock, MD of intY CASCADE, commented: "Unified Communications remains an exciting and competitive space in the industry. We're thrilled alwaysOn has decided to bring its latest platform to a wider audience via CASCADE.

"The partnership with Eclipse represents a substantial milestone in creating the option for a complete end-to-end solution for CASCADE users."

Pete Tomlinson, Director of Sales and Marketing at Eclipse comments "SMBs are now really seeing the value of adopting cloud services as part of a more flexible, productive way of working. Being able to work with their communications provider to adopt cloud services in a way that is straightforward and well supported is the perfect route to success."

Eclipse's real time connection-monitoring tool, Sentinel will also be available to intY support to service customers by proactively monitoring connections and providing support as and when it is needed.

Baldock added: "These two companies demonstrate the bring and buy benefits of CASCADE. Both are exploiting the platform to better sell to its customers, whilst offering its products and services to other partners.

"Of particular significance to our resellers will be the signing of Eclipse. The reputation of cloud services is the quality of the connection - connectivity and the physical infrastructure required to enable a high performance cloud solution should be a priority for resellers wanting to get in the game. With the recent addition of Cisco products and now Eclipse' services on CASCADE, end users can realise the true RoI of cloud."

James Byles, MD at alwaysOn, commented: "Being a CASCADE partner enabled us to deploy cloud services and building blocks for new solutions, tailored to suit our clients needs. We now want to take the relationship with intY to another level and offer our Lync 2013 product for partners and resellers to utilise as part of their offerings. We remain focused on the expansion of our business, and this relationship will help the two companies grow together side by side."

Computer 2000 is to operate under the Tech Data banner, the same name as all of the group's European and global operations.

Peter Hubbard, Managing Director UK and Ireland for Tech Data, stated: "The rebrand is an important milestone in the history of the UK organisation. It lays the foundation for the forthcoming integration of SDG into the Tech Data UK business and the Collection of Specialists - Azlan, Datech, Maverick and Tech Data Mobile."

The rebranding plan includes external signage, website, marketing collateral and stationery. For resellers and vendors, the transition to the Tech Data brand will be seamless, confirmed the company.

Anglia Business Solutions has appointed Nikki Scarr as COO, bringing nearly 30 years of industry knowledge and experience in enterprise resource planning (ERP) and supply chain and performance management to drive Anglia's plan for international expansion.

Prior to joining Anglia Business Solutions Nikki Scarr was Vice President of consulting at Infor Global Solutions where she was responsible for managing a large Professional Services business across EMEA with a turnover of $80 million.

Her objectives for the first 12 months include managing the launch of the company's LINKFresh food supply chain ERP solution on the Microsoft Dynamics AX platform, significantly increasing the footprint for LINKFresh in both the UK and US marketplace and building on the project delivery and support capability within the organisation.

Scarr said: "I see a wonderful growth opportunity in this company and the solutions it offers. Coming from a large US company which has undergone significant growth I feel I can use my expertise to make a real impact on this business in its UK, European and US markets.

"I'm ERP born and bred and my objectives are to facilitate the growth plans, develop the business proposition and, most of all, further improve the service to our customers."

Anglia's Group CEO Robert Frost added: "Nikki has a proven track record of fostering team spirit and achieving sustained growth in terms of both revenue and profit. Following last year's £6 million management buyout, I'm confident that Nikki will add value by nurturing our already exceptionally strong management team and helping us to achieve our goal of annual revenues of over £20 million within the next three years."

Nimans has marked the first anniversary of its iQ PBX system with record sales levels.

The IP solution based on Asterisk open architecture was officially launched last Autumn and incorporates feature rich functionality including Microsoft Lync integration as part of an out-of-the-box solution, according to the firm.

iQ PBX Business Manager Judith Addison said: "The iQ PBX success story continues to grow. We've had record sales for the past two months that coincide with its first anniversary. Sales are growing over 20% month-on-month.

"It's been a year to remember and I'm sure the next 12 months will be even more successful. I'd like to thank everyone that's played a part, especially my customers and the sales and support staff at Nimans."

One programme, one focus - one to watch: That's the upshot on Avaya's new mid-market partner scheme, called iConnect, designed to funnel partners through a week-long speed learning course that arms resellers with 16 Avaya accreditations and the know-how to confidently march into the mid-market - in return for a 'small investment' from partners.

The packaged programme shifts up a gear from the piecemeal approach to achieving competency and will be rolled out across selected European markets throughout the end of 2013 and into 2014. It bundles targeted sales, marketing and technical training and support, and accelerates the process of getting partners trained, certified and selling to customers in this segment, according to Avaya.

In more detail, sales training will be conducted by regional Avaya and distribution sales experts, and also in the mix is support for vertical positioning in healthcare, education, manufacturing and professional services. Also offered is on-site and hands-on training with working demo kits ready for deployment at the end of the session.

Exclusive marketing and training tools along with website content syndication and access to premium content and end user events organised by Avaya are also included in the scheme.

Michelle Jones, EMEA Channel Development and Marketing Director, Avaya, said: "As dynamic organisations, mid-market companies have been emerging as a ripe opportunity for some time now. While markets have been flattening more generally, the mid-market continues to defy the downturn.

"It's widely known that medium-sized businesses offer high growth opportunity with faster time to cash, but this market continues to be underserved. We've created Avaya iConnect to give partners quick and easy access to all the training they need in one place so that they can really take advantage of this lucrative market opportunity."

Existing partners such as Aurora Networks, Capstone, G3, iQual and Pennine Telecom have already signed up to the programme.

Niall Anderson, Sales and Marketing Director, G3 Communications, added: "The mid-market is a special sector and it has many distinct characteristics associated with growth by innovation. For the channel, it not only presents a large opportunity with good return on effort and shorter sales cycles, but it's also more resilient to economic recession. For me, iConnect has the clear focus and solid execution plan required to help partners penetrate this market. It has given us an effective decision-making framework, which is then underpinned by investment in new resources and programmes."

Cloud-based VoIP telephone system specialist nconnect has launched a UK channel campaign and aims to sign up 40 new partners before the end of this year.

The German provider of cloud telephony services to the enterprise market is expanding into the UK and targeting IT resellers and MSPs without voice expertise, claiming it can help them win a slice of the £100m left on the table by IT-only resellers unable to sell voice.

Under its German brand NFON, nconnect has gained over 5,000 enterprise scale customers including Thomson Reuters and insurance giant Allianz, and is looking for similar penetration into the UK market with support from resellers.

"Voice vendors have conspired to alienate IT and data-orientated partners from taking full advantage of enterprise voice opportunities, setting the bar too high on in-house technical skills and having prohibitively expensive vendor accreditations," said Rami Houbby, UK MD of nconnect.

"That's over now that nconnect is offering a simple and reliable cloud based service to transact with confidence. We believe over £100m gets left on the table by voiceless resellers year-in, year-out, but now they can finally capitalise on the full potential of their customer relationships and make big inroads into those revenues with limited investment and no risk."

nconnect's partner programme offers Platinum, Gold and Silver partners fast access to its cloud telephony platform, together with lead generation support, pre-sales consultancy, life-time commissions, evaluation kits and training with the European nconnect university.

"Partners don't need to hold any handset stock while self-install, infrastructure-less deployments mean limited time on site," added Houbby.

Mike Washburn has joined Red Box Recorders as Chairman, and working alongside CEO Lee Jones and the Board he will leverage his 35 years of business experience in the accountancy, consultancy, investment and technology sectors.
 
The appointment follows the management buy-out of the company earlier this year that was backed ISIS Equity Partners.

With considerable experience as an independent Chairman, particularly in the areas of MBO and acquisition, Washburn will support the ongoing growth of Red Box Recorders by helping to ensure the direction and strategy of the business is being effectively developed and implemented.
 
Washburn is also currently Chairman of HTIP, an ISIS Acquisition Vehicle, and Data Seeker, a big data technology company.

Previously, he spent five years as Managing Director of Scriptswitch, a provider of clinical decision making software in the healthcare sector, growing the company into a £50 million business.

Prior to this he held Managing Director roles at Givara, Chameleon Approach, Chameleon Group, MFPS and Business Solutions Group.
 
Jones commented: "Mike is a highly professional and energetic entrepreneur who has a strong track record of building value in companies.

"He possesses a wealth of experience that will provide considerable value to the business by strengthening the senior management team and supporting our ambitious growth plans."

Mobile apps are playing an increasingly important role for customer service organisations according to research by Sabio which found that mobile customer service apps are already helping to reduce calls to contact centres, while at the same time delivering increased levels of customer satisfaction.

The poll looked at how the increased use of mobile apps on smartphones and tablets is impacting the traditional contact centre model and 54% of those questioned confirmed that the introduction of dedicated mobile applications is having a positive impact on their customer service activities - and already leading to improvements in customer satisfaction levels.

Of those polled, however, 48% are still to address the apps opportunity - although 22% or the organisations surveyed expected to be working on their own apps within the next year. According to respondents, the top five reasons cited for introducing a mobile app were: Increased brand awareness and marketing opportunities; reducing call volumes into the contact centre; as a tool to handle levels of customer demand; internal pressures to deliver more customer contact choice; and the automation of key service processes such as account self-management.

The development and running of these mobile apps programmes are still predominantly handled by an organisation's IT function, with marketing representing the second largest grouping, and only a few customer service operations entrusting apps responsibility to their contact centre teams.

"Our goal from this research project was to find out just how today's leading customer service organisations are addressing the apps phenomenon," commented Stuart Dorman, Head of Sabio's Consultancy Practice.

"Given the growth in smartphone and tablet usage, and with smartphone penetration in the UK now running at over 60%, it's hardly surprising that more and more of us are choosing to engage with organisations via mobile apps. Sabio was keen to establish whether customer service providers were making the most of apps from both a brand and a functionality perspective.

"It's clear that today's smart devices and mobile apps are opening up new organisations for both customers and organisations alike.

"The latest mobile and app-optimised channels effectively give users the opportunity to bypass traditional IVR channels and get on with completing interactions themselves.

"At Sabio we estimate that these initiatives could potentially lead to a reduction of overall contact centre traffic volumes by some 10-15%. This level of demand shift was echoed in our Mobile Apps survey, with 19% of respondents saying that the deployment of apps had reduced calls, and 12% seeing a reduction in email volumes."

Unified World Communications has achieved Vodafone Solution Specialist accreditation, meaning the firm is fully capable of selling and supporting the unified communications product portfolio from Vodafone, including One Net Business, One Net Express, Office 365, mobile device management and fixed line voice/data services.

"Our core objective is to help companies to simplify, centralise and save on their business communications," said Martin West, Head of IT Services. "The Solution Specialist accreditation supports our core objectives and enables us to be a new kind of communications partner in the business market."

This accreditation comes shortly after Unified World Communications was recognised as the Chamber of Commerce East Lancashire's endorsed provider for Unified Communications.