Comms Dealer

Six Degrees Group's (6DG) growth ambitions in the mid-market for converged cloud and application hosting have been significantly advanced following the addition of two big guns to the leadership line-up.

Former CEO of GTS Central Europe Danny Bottoms joins the company as Chairman and Paul Mills, ex-Head of Sales for Rackspace UK, has taken the role of Group Sales Director.

Bottoms brings 25 years experience in the comms and media industries including stints at PE backed companies. He is based in Virginia, USA.

Mills boasts 10 years sales management experience in the IT managed services space and has particular expertise in delivering across a mix of verticals and products.

6DG CEO Alastair Mills said: "The appointments are significant coups for Six Degrees.

"Danny has an excellent track record in PE backed technology companies, and Paul's experience in leading sales in managed hosting and managed services for the mid-market are exactly the areas we are targeting for our future growth around cloud platforms and application management services."

The country-level reorganisation and management for Dell EMC's channels will be announced in November, it says. Some elements of the new partner programme have already emerged ahead of its formal single programme due in February next year. Some Dell EMC people were being told this week or their new roles.

Using the deal registrations going back over the last three years there has been some local arbitration over customers with both Dell and EMC channels as suppliers, but this is not seen as a significant issue, Michael Collins, Dell EMC's EMEA channels chief tells IT Europa. "We have a broad and deep channel. We are working on answering their questions, and through training, education and certifications, giving us the channel we need."

"The channel programme will be based on profitability, predictability and simplicity," he says, aiming at a high comfort level among partners, but also building 'peer envy' to encourage them to seek higher position in the tiers. Fast-track cross-training has been in place to bring both partner groups up to speed on the other's products. It has been further complicated by Dell's decisions to sell off the enterprise content division and to abandon the printer business, but this does not affect large numbers of partners in Europe.

Dell has been encourage, he says, by surveys of enterprise customers almost all saying they are positive or at least neutral about the merger, and with most suggesting they will increase their spending with the new firm.

The uncertainty in the channel about the nature of the new organisation has been addressed by partner conferences recently in the UK and a joint eastern/western European channels meeting this week. "It is not easy to predict the shape of the future channel," he says, but points to high levels of planned investment in cloud, particularly in managed services by systems integrators. "Many integrator partners are investing in hardware cloud as well," he says.

Modernisation of infrastructure seems to be a key driving factor; Dell has announced both reference architectures for solutions and the tighter "blueprints" for specific tasks, business outcomes and user numbers. This demand from customers will obviously colour the continuing nature of Dell EMC's channel. "We must not lose focus on the customer for the longer term," he says, in spite of "the challenge of joining the two very credible companies."

Noetica has launched the Noetica Voice Platform (NVP), delivering ACD, IVR, voice recording, quality management and billing, in a telephony solution built purely for the use of contact centres.

NVP can be deployed either on-premise or in the cloud, and frees contact centres from the requirement of an enterprise PBX and cuts the cost of inbound, outbound and blended telephony, claims the firm.

Prior to launch, NVP has been in live production at Noetica clients including ResQ, Parseq and RSVP. Many of these organisations have been able to reduce, or eradicate their reliance on large enterprise telephony platforms.

RSVP is using NVP across 220 seats at its London office with plans to replace all PBX units with NVP. Its new 100-seat Manchester site will be running NVP from launch.

CEO of Noetica, Danny Singer, said: "Telephony is rapidly becoming a commodity and a 'one size fits all' way of delivering calls to back-office and the call centre is now obsolete."

Following the reintroduction of the Storno brand as part of Nimans' two-way radio portfolio the distributor is offering two-way radio demo kits in a bid to help resellers tap into the £80m UK licensed market.

The firm has also produced on-site testing guides.

Nimans' Radio Communications Category Manager Gary Redshaw said: "Storno licensed radios are viewed as a key introduction for resellers new to the sector as they combine performance with reliability. Fitted with the latest lithium ion battery technology they benefit from easy out of the box performance.

"We've had a very positive response to bringing back the Storno name and the demo kits will help pour more fuel onto the fire.

"We supply licenced and licence free equipment with both Digital Mobile Radio (DMR) and Private Mobile Radio (PMR) devices available.

"Two-way radio has always been an important element of our business based on Julian Nimans' passion and keen interest in this sector. We've sold devices from day one and are now able to offer resellers access to more powerful licenced equipment that can communicate over much longer distances."

Infrastructure provider CityFibre has announced that businesses in Sheffield City Region will soon be able to exploit the advantages of gigabit speed Internet services in a partnership with Exa Networks

CityFibre is set to open up a next-generation pure fibre network across Sheffield, Doncaster and Rotherham enabling them to join the growing ranks of Gigabit Cities as the company continues to introduce fibre infrastructure competition nationwide.

The network, which spans 110km, will provide local businesses with some of the fastest download and upload speeds in the world, up to and exceeding 1000mbps.

The Sheffield, Doncaster and Rotherham Gigabit City projects are being delivered in partnership with Exa Networks, which is already delivering ultra-fast connectivity across CityFibre's networks in Bradford and Leeds.

Rob Hamlin, Commercial Director at CityFibre, commented: "Organisations large and small now require reliable, fast, low latency Internet services to compete and succeed in an ever changing digital world."

Mark Cowgill, Co-Founder of Exa Networks, added: "We understand the crucial importance of ultra-fast connectivity in our schools as well as our businesses, and anticipate a huge demand for increased bandwidth in both the education and business communities of Sheffield."

CityFibre and Exa will be hosting Gigabit City launch events in Sheffield and Doncaster on 15th November, where local business representatives will hear more about how the Gigabit City project can benefit them and revolutionise the way they operate.

Bamboo Technology Group's M2M channel business is booming with a growing posse of reseller partners embracing its M2M proposition. M2M was first introduced to Bamboo's Total Partner Programme in October last year and since January 2016 the firm has witnessed 31% average month-on-month growth in connected M2M devices and 71% average month-on-month growth in data volume.

MD Lorrin White attributes much of this growth to a flexible pence-per-kilobyte wholesale data plan that has proved popular among firms with small data requirements and large organisations that wish to create their own bundles.

"Our M2M channel has been a resounding success in the short time since its launch," said White. "Despite being a relatively new technology for the channel the reaction from resellers at this early stage is encouraging.

"The barriers to wide scale M2M adoption have generally been one of two things - customers either struggling to conceive where M2M can deliver its own unique value in place of a regular cellular or fixed line connection, or resellers unconvinced about the long-term profitability and viability of M2M even at a small scale. We believe we have been able to address both of these concerns with our M2M proposition."

Bamboo can also work with partners and customers to develop bespoke M2M packages and pricing structures that ensure the viability of new M2M product lines before a customer takes them to market.

"By giving our partners direct access to our pre-sales team, they have been able to demonstrate the real world potential of the technology to their customers," added White.

"As a result, we have seen new use cases as varied as mobile CCTV, temporary office Internet and even solar and wind farm telematics, in addition to the more traditional use cases in fleet and asset tracking for example."

According to White, offering M2M SIMs on a wholesale pence-per-kilobyte basis has significantly lowered the entrance fee for this market. "This has given our partners the flexibility to build their own bundles so they can succeed with customers of all sizes, from heavy data users to those that use very little data at all," she said.

"This wouldn't have been possible if we had enforced high volume data packages or fixed tariffs. Helping resellers to identify and understand the opportunity has been key. Whereas previously they may have walked away from a potential deal because they couldn't see how to make it viable, we now have the flexibility in the tariffs to meet even the most specific of requirements and deliver growth for all."

Bamboo's M2M proposition is powered by Telefónica, a long standing partner. Bernie McPhillips, Head of M2M Authorised Distributor Channel at Telefónica UK, added: "Bamboo's innovation in the M2M sector and strong track record within the mobile arena is clearly resonating with the channel."

Bamboo's M2M service for resellers also includes monitoring and control features via the Cisco Jasper IoT services platform; all SIMs deliver connectivity across multiple networks globally under one bill (due to 600 network roaming agreements worldwide, including 4G coverage in 26 countries); IPSec VPN for advanced network integration; and flexible deployment options such as the provision of test-ready SIMS.

Following a series of stints working for big telecoms businesses Stephen Taylor's search for a new role within a more dynamic smaller company where plans can more quickly be turned into action has culminated in his appointment as Product Manager at Manchester-based Invosys.

He moved from Sage Software where he managed a portfolio of compliance products for UK&I based accountants.

Previous roles also include Campaign Implementation Manager and then Business Change Manager at BT, followed by five years at Opal Telecom/TalkTalk Technology.

Taylor said: "Having always worked for large incumbents I had a desire to be a bigger fish in a smaller pond where I can help deliver innovative solutions that make a difference to the user base in realistic timescales.

"Invosys is a fast-paced, ambitious and dynamic organisation with big plans. Who wouldn't want to be part of that?"

Invosys founder Peter Crooks added: "Stephen's expertise will help us achieve our vision to become the global innovators in the communication software industry."

Invosys was established 10 years ago and specialises in developing, hosting and deploying network-based call management technology.

The company manages more than one million minutes per day for a range of customers including high street retailers and public sector corporations.

James Vickerage has been appointed to President of ScanSource Communications in Europe. He takes over from Ian Vickerage who is stepping down from the role.

James Vickerage joined ScanSource through the company's 2014 acquisition of Imago, the distributor of video and voice communications equipment and services.

He joined Imago in 1997 and worked in senior sales and marketing roles for the company.

Prior to his appointment as President Vickerage served as Vice President in the UK and Ireland for ScanSource Communications, where he led the sales, merchandising and marketing teams.

"Since the acquisition, James has held strategic leadership roles within ScanSource Communications in Europe," said Buck Baker, president of Worldwide Communications and Services for ScanSource.

"His experience in the industry, as well as his wealth of knowledge of our suppliers and partners, will serve the company well in this new leadership role."

The marriage of Gamma's Horizon hosted IP telephony service and Akixi's management reporting and wallboard integration is proving popular among 174 Horizon resellers who have introduced the combined solution to over 535 customer sites with an average of 28 seats per end user.

Currently there are 13,400-plus live extensions across Akixi-Horizon reseller sites, with the largest having over 2,000 extensions.

Gamma boasts more than 920 channel partners and its three year relationship with Akixi will continue to pay dividends as a growing number of resellers embrace its call reporting and call management solution, according to Akixi MD Bart Delgado (pictured).

"The outcome of this partnership has been marvellous," he enthused. "Every month we get an influx of Horizon resellers who successfully come on board with us."

Alan Mackie, Product Director at Gamma, added: "Horizon customers are able to optimise their hosted IP telephony service by combining it with Akixi.

"At the same time it gives our channel partners an opportunity to generate additional recurring revenue and build stickier customer relationships."

One such reseller, Focus Group, needed to provide its Horizon customers with a call centre tool. The firm's MD, Ralph Gilbert, said: "Offering Akixi with Horizon enables our customers to manage employees, campaigns and resources as part of one call reporting and call management solution."

Akixi began its commercial life in 2008 and the company now has 1,900 active sites globally, serving customers in Europe, USA, South Africa and Mexico.

"We have over 200 sets of historical and real-time call statistics, dials, alarms, charts and desktop wallboards," added Delgado.

"The service is compatible with BroadSoft, Siemens and Panasonic platforms and scales from two to over 10,000 users."

Tech Data has swung its gaze onto the health sector and published a channel guide that supports a series of promotions aimed at unlocking the potential to generate revenue in healthcare environments.

The initiative reflects an increase in IT investments across the heath service as the NHS seeks to make £22bn of efficiency savings by 2020.

According to research ERP systems and the sharing of patient records and information are the top priorities.

Kirsty Guy (pictured), Public Sector Marketing Manager at Tech Data, said: "The aim of the Focus on Healthcare campaign is to highlight some of the areas of potential.

"We always see a pick-up in activity in the healthcare sector at this time of year, so now is the right time for resellers to follow-up these opportunities and take some positive messages out to market."

Tech Data will update its Virtual Hospital environments with new products, confirmed Guy.

The company leverages three primer health-focused resources - a Virtual Waiting Room, Virtual Ward Room, and Virtual Consulting Room.

"These areas show specific technologies that can be used in these key healthcare settings," said Guy.