SME & CONSUMER NEWS
Westcon secures Italy.....
Trend Micro on the road
EUROPE
ITALY
Security, convergence and networking are the
key areas which the company aims at developing TREND Micro’s
WESTCON has announced the launch of Westcon throughout 2008. “Our focus is to consolidate our channel roadshow is
Security in the Italian market. Through the initiative, relationship with the vendors, but in order to do so hitting 87 cities in 87
Italian resellers will be able the enjoy security we need to reinforce our offer by providing further days. Dervla Mannion
solutions from leading vendors such as Juniper, services and expanding our team,” he explains. (right), Director SB
SonicWALL, Blue Coat, Barracuda and F5, it says. Manidi reveals his office currently employs 15 Channel EMEA, tells
“We officially became a Westcon branch on people, a number which is due to increase towards IT Europa this is
February 6,” Westcon Italy country manager Sergio the size of the 100-strong Westcon France branch. part of a channel
Manidi (below) tells IT Europa, “And we had a very He says that, if the aim is to become a true VAD, outreach initiative:
positive response from our partners.” they need to focus on services such as pre- and ”We wanted to give
Manidi points out that, although at present post-sales assistance, technical support, training the opportunity for
their portfolio is quite and marketing. partner to have a personalised interactive way to
limited compared He says that Westcon has the know-how, partner with Trend - not a generic approach. We’re
to other European competencies and logistics to offer its partners an trying to focus on helping them increase their
branches, the Italian excellent service: “We are present in Italy, Spain, business opportunities.”
subsidiary is planning France, Belgium, Germany and the UK, as well as The approach is detailed education – “our
to enhance its offer in eastern Europe.” However, he points out that in own offerings, keeping momentum with existing
the next few months by Italy they need some time to enhance their offer products, identifying new revenue opportunities,
signing a few contracts by building up the local structure. “We don’t lack and breaking down the format to give them the
with major vendors resources for investments and our partners are chance for breakouts and workshops sessions.”
“with a global and pan- looking forward to buying more products from us,” The education is about the rising web threat
European coverage”. he concludes. www.westcongroup.com - what it means to resellers, and how the products
are put to use. “We’re watching the registrations
....and adds Juniper Networks
come in – it looks like we’ll have over 5,000.
And we may well add cities to the list to give us
EUROPE
in convergence - perhaps bringing in voice resellers geographic coverage.”
WESTCON Group is now offering Juniper’s infra- with no experience of security.” “We’re working with the distributors who are
structure and security products throughout its And it will play a part in Westcon’s new keen that their resellers get the message to their
European geographies – the Netherlands, Belgium, “University” - a half day course for resellers going customers. Working with Ingram Micro in particular
Germany, France, Ireland, Austria, Italy and the UK. into new areas such as VOIP, mobility and wireless. – our strategic partner of choice – complementary
Kay Eggleston, MD at Westcon’s NOXS division in This is expected to launch globally in April. strategy and outreach for us is vital. We also aim to
the UK, tells IT Europa, “We aim to grow resellers www.westcongroup.com increase our reseller numbers.”
“Sitting down with the existing partners, we’re
looking at how we can double their revenues, but
alongside this is extending our own reach and
sme and consumer round-up
raising the numbers. There is absolutely no danger
of over doing it on partner numbers,” she says.
The roadshow is one avenue - other plans
include centralised communication in the
CCD, the distribution arm of Computacenter, to meet demand in Europe. This facility will
operations centre which works on opening the
has appointed Steve Bradbury as as Storage be able to produce five million desktop PCs
Category Manager, taking charge of this newly-
door with the reseller market. “We’re very much
per year.
created division. Steve Bradbury leaves his role
looking at increasing focus in the emerging markets:
within the HP Enterprise Channel team to join
fujitsu Siemens Computers is putting
UK, Germany and the southern states have had
CCD, and will take up his new position on 3
further investment into the channel in the
the focus in the past. We’re looking forward to
March. He will be responsible for both enterprise
current quarter to drive growth in sales of
stepping up activity, specifically in the Russian,
and volume storage at CCD.
its PRIMERGY server range. Joint marketing Polish and Czech markets – our products have
and promotional activities with its authorised
been localised for these customer groups.”
Lenovo says that to reach the number one
partners over the next three months will
Looking back at 2007 they saw a slow-down
or two slot in the industry it needs to stop
maintain the higher-than-market-growth rates
outsourcing its manufacturing and bringing it
against expectations. “This is why we want to get
achieved over the past year, it says.
all in-house, as well as dropping the idea of a
more active in education. End of 2007 we saw a
global company headquarters. Executives will
lot of interest in our ‘Worry-Free Remote Manager
Microsoft and Cisco will work together to
instead stay in their areas of responsibility
service’ – a huge uptake, and we’ve noticed in the
offer Windows Server 2008 with Cisco WAN
and meet up as-required. It will soon bring its
optimization in a solution for branch office
queries and interest from the roadshow that there
new manufacturing centre in Poland on line
environments.
is a lot of interest in this service. This gives us a
good platform for 2008.” www.trendmicro.com
29 fEb 2008 11
It0804 - 8-11_SME_news.indd 11 27/02/2008 11:03:28
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