Nortel has recognised the achievements of its partner community at the PartnerFocus event in London on Tuesday 9th June. Held at the Hilton Metropole in London, PartnerFocus is Nortel's annual opportunity to highlight the successes of its valued partners.

This year, in a new category for 2009, Avnet received the award for Distribution Partner of the Year. The award recognised Avnet's commitment, hard work and loyalty to Nortel and Laura Harman, Nortel Business Unit Director, who accepted the award on behalf of Avnet, said: "I'm honoured to accept this award on behalf of the Avnet team. We pride ourselves on our dedication to providing the best business solutions for our customer and this award is the perfect endorsement of our efforts. This award is also a testament to the unique partnership that Avnet has with Nortel. Our teams work together with great passion and dedication and we hope the relationship continues for a long time to come."

PartnerFocus London was the largest and last in a series of Nortel partner events that have taken place around the UK (Leeds and Edinburgh) and Ireland (Dublin) over the past weeks. Individual 2009 award winners announced at the London PartnerFocus event included:

Joanna Bradley and Lee Chambers (APSL) - Best Support Partner
For their tireless efforts with Nortel's managed and unmanaged channels.

Martin Williams (Connect) - Best Channel Sales Engineer
For his determination and technical knowledge of Nortel products.

Dave Garwood (Westcon) - Best Marketing Campaign
For being the consummate marketer and demonstrating how distributors can deliver added value to Nortel marketing materials.

Claire Sames (Westcon) - Best Distributor Salesperson
For her excellent level of support for Nortel sales teams.

Seamus McCory (BT) - Best Reseller Salesperson
For his continued support for Nortel, even during tough times.

Other Nortel partner companies who received awards at the London event included:
Lee Hobson (Affiniti) - Best Call Centre Win
Rob Georgeson (Intrinsic) - Best Unified Communications Win
Jo Upton (TMG) - Best Win with Small to Medium Businesses

"On behalf of Nortel I've been thrilled to be able to congratulate the 2009 winners at PartnerFocus, not only in London but also at our other events in the UK and Ireland," said Mario DiMascio, vice president, Enterprise Sales, Northern Region EMEA. "This is a crucial time for Nortel to connect with its partners and I want to thank them all for their continuing efforts. The consistent performance of Nortel's partners has a lot to do with the quality and dedication of their teams and all their awards are well-deserved."

About PartnerFocus
Nortel stages a series of PartnerFocus events around Europe each year to stay in touch with the needs of its most important and valued channel partners and resellers. In 2009, the events are focused on equipping Nortel partners to ‘Make More of Today'. In addition, events will include networking opportunities and updates from Nortel on its business, technology and key areas of focus for 2009.

PartnerFocus Winners 2009 - Roll Call of Winners from Leeds, Edinburgh and Dublin Events.

Leeds: Crowne Plaza Hotel on the 12th May
Helen Van Nuil (Avnet) - Best Distributor Salesperson
For developing longstanding and fruitful relationships with customers that have proved resilient in an increasingly difficult economic landscape.

Sara Rawcliffe (Intrinsic Technology) - Best Marketing Campaign
For executing innovative and successful marketing campaigns in the Education and Pharmaceutical industries.

Ben Vandyk (Connect) - Best Support Partner
For excellent work under pressure, delivering projects on time and on budget and securing customer satisfaction.

Other partners receiving awards at the Leeds event were:
John Nearney (BT) - Best Reseller Sales Person
For working tirelessly with Nortel as a key regional sales specialist and for having an extremely successful year in terms of sales.

Tim Williams (Avnet) - Best Channel Sales Engineer
For the excellent support provided for short timescale bids and for working tirelessly to further relationships within the Education sector.

Dublin: Conrad Hotel on the 18th May
John Carroll (BT) - Best Channel Sales Engineer
For being instrumental in closing key customer deals and developing BT teams to ensure they have the skills required to meet the Nortel Gold Solutions accreditation.

Cable & Wireless Team - Best Support Partner
For their team work and repeated success with customers.

Sinead Slattery (Eircom) - Best Marketing Campaign
For creating a bespoke campaign, to encourage over 2000 customers to upgrade their existing telecoms solutions, that showed exceptional results.

John O'Brien (Eircom) - Best Reseller Salesperson
For skill in building a rapport and trust with customers, finding and solving customer's business challenges and securing multiple deals throughout 2008.

Other partners receiving awards at the Dublin event were:
Tommy Graham (BT) - Best Call Centre Win
Jeff Hillis/John Carroll/Robert Smith (BT) - Best Unified Communications Win
Martin Flaherty (Eircom) - Best Win with Small to Medium Businesses

Edinburgh: Balmoral Hotel in Edinburgh on the 2nd June
Jim Keeney (BT) - Best Reseller Salesperson
For continued dedication and hard work.

Dave Dewar (BT) - Best Channel Sales Engineer
For demonstrating extensive knowledge of Nortel's technology.

Intrinsic - Best Supporting Partner

Other partners receiving awards at the Leeds event were:
Nick Welsh, Dave Dewar and Iain Veitch (BT) - Best Call Centre Win
Nick Welsh, Robert Taylor and Dave Dewar (BT) - Best Unified Communications Win
Ian Nicol (BT) - Best SMB Win