Disti, TSB Update: Ingram, Avant, TD Synnex, Jenne, Master Agent Rebrand, More
Acquisitions, private equity funding, new suppliers and new programs.
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Partners expressed their confusion over the consolidation occuring among TSBs.
Larger brokerages are gobbling up their regional peers, to the point where many partners anticipate the number of distribution partners to drop to only a few dozen.
“Who are the interests of the remaining 30? Whom do they serve? Who’s their master? What butters their bread? By and large, it’s private equity and return on investment,” said Christopher Scott, principal owner of StratoNet.
Partners also discussed the motivations of those joining agent roll-ups.
Check out the commentary from partners.
Another niche TSB entered the market, this time focusing on customer experience.
Andrew Pryfogle, a former cloud leader at Intelisys, formally launched CX Effect, a brokerage that specializes in software solutions like customer relationship management (CRM), business process outsourcing (BPO) and contact center as a service (CCaaS).
Pryfogle explained that CX Effect’s laser focus on these technologies has led the associated vendors to offer commission levels it has never before offered to the agent channel.
Get details on the new company.
D&H Distributing announced a new partner community.
PartnerFi Community officially went live Jan. 1. Participating members can access discounts, credit incentives and access to subject matter experts. PartnerFi operates through a K-12 education track and a traditional VAR/MSP track.
Edward Gately has the scoop.
Distribution giant Ingram Micro enjoyed a busy end to the year.
Ingram in October tapped a new director of global partner engagement for Dell and VMware. The hire had been working for Eaton 15 years.
Then Ingram in December announced the sale of its Commerce & Lifecycle Services (CLS) for $3 billion to a container shipping line. The deal lets Ingram focus on “distribution and cloud services capabilities.”
A couple of security providers entered the channel through TSB partnerships late last year.
Nord Security made a splash last fall with its Avant partnership. It went on to sign with Telarus.
Bandura Cyber took a similar route, announcing a partnership with Avant in December.
Read about Nord and Bandura‘s partnerships.
AppDirect raised private equity funding that will go exclusively to partners.
AppDirect, out of which the B2B marketplace provider AppSmart runs, got an investment from Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ). The funds will fortify the AppSmart Invest program, which gives agents money in return for an exclusive relationship.
In addition, the funds will help AppDirect build a new capital arm.
Read about the funding news.
Technology solutions brokerages are always signing new suppliers.
Innovative Business Solutions made some waves by signing a partnership with AT&T Business. Innovative, which is known for its cable portfolio, added AT&T to give its partners more diverse sources of connectivity. It also added Altice USA, Optimum Business and Suddenlink Communications.
In the meantime, Avant signed a deal with Texas-based fiber provider Logix Fiber Networks.
Read about the Innovative and Avant stories.
The conversation about rebranding the artists formerly known as master agents seemed to reach a conclusion in the fall.
A yearlong debate about how these companies should style themselves reached a measure of consensus when the Xposure Inclusion & Diversity Council announced it was drafting a letter. The letter would ask companies to rebrand themselves as technology solutions brokerages (TSBs) or any other name.
The issue focused primarily on the racial connotations of the word “master,” especially when it describes the relationship between TSBs and their partners.
Companies like Telarus, Jenne and TBI officially announced new branding.
Check out the video of a panel about the rebranding debate.
Vendor awards always lend interesting insights into how partners are performing.
The AT&T Alliance Channel spotlighted 60-plus partners for their sales success. Presto Tech Solutions and Nordicom Technologies scored a cut above the rest in the platinum elite category.
Familiar faces lined the platinum category, including Telarus and Intelisys.
See the full list of awards. In addition, AT&T channel exec Chris Jones dished on how the company transformed its programs tobetter serve TSB partners.
Chicago-based Avant agreed to a private equity deal with Pamlico Capital.
The financially undisclosed deal pairs Avant with an investor that Avant execs say doesn’t want to interfere with the company’s organic growth strategy.
“… they’re ultimately going to enable us to continue to do what we do, just faster and better than we have in the past and not push us to the areas that we don’t want to go into or may not be creative to the business. Getting bigger doesn’t necessarily mean getting better too. Getting better means getting better,” CEO Ian Kieninger told Channel Futures.
Read a Q&A with Kieninger about how the company will use the funds.
DCC Technology, otherwise known as Exertis, grew its North America presence via acquisition.
The Irish distributor bought Philadelphia-based Almo Corp. Exertis has bought other companies and plans to become “the largest specialist Pro AV business in North America.”
Christine Horton wrote about the acquisition.
Longtime Lenovo vet Sammy Kinlaw found a new position inside TD Synnex.
Kinlaw, who had been serving as senior vice president of sales for the Americas, moved to senior vice president of sales communities in North America. The change puts him in charge of the Varnex SMB community, which comes from the Synnex side. Kinlaw will also lead the Tech Select and Stellr groups.
Read about the appointment.
Channel legend Vince Bradley started a new venture.
Bradley departed from AppSmart to form Abundant IoT, a new technology services distributor. He said the company’s business model will in many ways replicate the model at WTG, which AppDirect acquired to form AppSmart. However, he said Abundant IoT will help partners monetize equipment and devices for recurring revenue.
Read our Q&A with Bradley.
ScanSource‘s latest earnings revealed interesting insights about Intelisys‘ book of business.
Intelisys has gone from VARs representing 30% of its sales partners in 2016 to 56%. Moreover, Intelisys upped its VAR-driven supplier billings by 23% in the last quarter.
Read more about the financial update.
TSBs continued to bring flesh blood into their organizations.
Jenne made a big move in hiring Shawn Berry, a former employee of NetFortris and Telarus, as its senior vice president of global cloud channel sales.
TBI tapped a regional vice president of sales for the western U.S. as well as a cloud communications architect.
TSBs continued to bring flesh blood into their organizations.
Jenne made a big move in hiring Shawn Berry, a former employee of NetFortris and Telarus, as its senior vice president of global cloud channel sales.
TBI tapped a regional vice president of sales for the western U.S. as well as a cloud communications architect.
Technology distributors and brokers announced big financial transactions and personnel appointments in the closing months of 2021.
Distribution continues to carve out a role for itself as an intermediary between customer-facing partners and the vendors whose offerings they sell. However, executives have their hands full with the rise of ecosystems and the increased emergence of super-partners.
The Global Technology Distribution Council (GTDC) proclaimed in November have “effectively adapted” to the changes of the last two years. For example, distributor cloud sales grew 27% in 2020, and distis are poised to take a chunk out of the XaaS market, according to the council.
In the meantime, the technology solutions brokerages (formerly known as master agents) and their partners got the jump on cloud. The TSB space continues to attract outside investment, with Avant earning private equity money in the fourth quarter.
The 15 images above encapsulated some of the biggest news in the traditional IT distribution and telecom brokerage markets in Q4 2021.
Check out our Q3 recap if you missed it.
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