Nuvias has announced an elite club of channel players called the Global Technology Distribution Council (GTDC).
The consortium members include Exclusive Networks, Exertis, Ingram Micro, Infinigate, CMS Distribution and Arrow Electronics are responsible for more than $150 billion of sales of products, services and solutions.
Nuvias is a $750 million company with offices across Europe, it claims.
Ingram Micro has appointed Paul Bay is its new CEO, replacing Alain Monié who has become executive chairman.
Bay previously held the position of executive vice president and president of Global Technology Solutions at the distributor, as well as several other roles including president for the Americas and senior vice president of vendor management.
Platinum Equity has completed its $7.2 billion acquisition of distie Ingram Micro from HNA Group.
The deal was first announced in December last year following HNA’s decision to reduce some of its debts.
Ingram Micro turned over $49 billion in revenue in 2020, making it the world’s largest technology distributor, though the merger between Tech Data and Synnex is set to see it overtake its rival.
Security outfit Check Point has opened its distribution marketplace programme, working with Arrow Electronics and Ingram Micro to reach more partners.
The plan is to start with those two distributors and add more over time to increase the options for resellers that want to sell security via those types of marketplaces.
Check Point’s head of worldwide channel, Frank Rauch, said that as more organisations move applications, data, compute and security to the cloud, or create their own private cloud environments, Check Point is perfectly placed to capitalise on this move with its cloud solutions portfolio.
“This new programme further strengthens our commitment to helping our partners win new business and build even stronger relationships with existing customers. We plan to partner with additional marketplace distributors over the coming months to extend the programme.”
The dark satanic rumour mill has manufactured a hell on earth yarn claiming that Ingram Micro’s owner is in “advanced talks” to sell a majority stake in the distributor.
A group of investors, led by Asian private equity firm RRJ Capital, is finalising a deal to acquire a majority stake in Ingram Micro for $4 billion investment.
The deal will be firmed up within a few days and will involve the investor injecting funds via an HNA convertible bond that will give it control of Ingram Micro.
Ingram Micro UK Director Cloud and Advanced Solutions Scott Murphy has warned that while digital transformation is driving the market only 22 percent of channel partners are ready.
Murphy said that digital transformation is the top priority for most UK businesses – including the channel partners who serve them. And in many ways, cloud technology lies at the heart of the transformation journey.
Ingram asked 250 UK-based cloud end users from a variety of mid-market and enterprise organisations, alongside 50 cloud resellers themselves, compiling their answers into a white paper: ‘The intelligent future of cloud’ and discovered that while there is a huge opportunity out there for channel partners – it’s being lost.
Ingram Micro has acquired French cybersecurity VAD Abbakan, as part of the expansion of its cybersecurity business in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA). The acquisition of Abbakan expands Ingram Micro’s network of system integrators and telecommunications companies across France.
Sophie Deleval, Chief Executive for Ingram Micro France, said: “This acquisition cements the transformation we initiated two years ago to strengthen our ability to support our partners in developing their business and stay relevant and sustainable. Abbakan’s and Ingram Micro’s teams will combine their expertise, dynamism and engagement to provide an outstanding value proposition to the new market in which we operate.”
Ingram Micro has appointed Brian Verburg as the Manager of its European Cyber Security Center of Excellence. Brian will manage the Centre of Excellence (COE) recently launched in the Netherlands, that extends support across Europe, including Germany, UK, France, Spain, Nordics, Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Austria and Switzerland.
BlueJeans has penned a distribution deal with Ingram Micro as part of its push into the US market.
The pair already has teamed up in Europe and Asia Pacific market. Under the deal, Ingram Micro will send BlueJeans’ unified communications products, including BlueJeans Meetings, BlueJeans Rooms and BlueJeans Events up with its channel partners throughout the US. They will sell them on to businesses looking for collaboration tools.
Jeff Yelton, executive director of Ingram Micro, said that BlueJeans was a cloud-native meetings platform and a natural fit with Ingram’s growing unified communications and collaboration portfolio.
“Demand for intelligent workplaces is building among businesses of all sizes, and we’re excited to extend our relationship with BlueJeans and expand our U.S. portfolio to include BlueJean’s one-touch video, audio and web conferencing solutions”, he said.
Managing the relationship with Ingram Micro, BlueJeans has appointed a new SVP of global channels Barry Ruditsky who joins BlueJeans from Actiance, where he worked with ISVs and OEMs, including IBM, and launched a global VAR programme for the company.
“There is a terrific market opportunity for BlueJeans as we continue to work alongside the industry’s best partners, including Ingram Micro. Enterprise companies in every market segment are fully aware of the impact that meeting and collaboration solutions like BlueJeans have on the morale, engagement and bottom line of the business. There is an endless runway for us to grow with our partner community.”
Ingram Micro U.K. & Ireland has entered into a partnership with digital infrastructure specialist, Legrand.
The idea is to strengthen Ingram Micro’s end-to-end enterprise solution and offers services specialist Comms-care further value-add solutions to Ingram Micro’s resellers.
For those who came in late, Legrand is a global specialist in electrical and digital building infrastructure. It has Cable Management business unit brands such as Cablofil wire mesh, Swifts Cable trays, and Ladder rack, Salamandre Trunking and the EZ Path. These solutions will complement the Ingram Microenterprise business unit and vendors such as Cisco, HPE and Dell Enterprise infrastructure offering for resellers.
Legrand offers gear for data centres including enterprise cabling, racking, and connectivity. The company’s specialist brands include Minkel, Raritan, Electrak, and Zucchini. Legrand is a leader in Enterprise Connected Infrastructure solutions for data centres and large infrastructures.
Scott Murphy, Advanced Solutions Director at Ingram Micro, said: “The addition of Legrand and their brands/solutions further demonstrates Ingram Micro’s vision to offer our reseller partner’s incremental but complementary end-to-end solutions to their existing customers. We are positive that our Ingram Micro Services (including Comms-care) ability to design and install Legrand’s Connected Infrastructure solution will bring incremental revenue and margin to our reseller partners both on the hardware and wraparound services.”
Jeff Platt, Sales Director for the Cable Management Business Unit at Legrand, added: “Deploying a large Cisco or HPE infrastructure will require Cable Management, Fire stopping, and other products across the Legrand portfolio. We will work closely with Comms-care to ensure the right solution today while future proofing. We currently operate closely with Cisco, HPE, Dell Enterprise and other Enterprise vendors to tailor our solutions to complement their solutions.”
Ingram Micro’s Chinese parent company has denied it is flogging the distributor to US-based Synnex.
The rumors started after one of Tianhai Investments’s subsidiaries suspended the trading of its shares on the Shanghai Stock Exchange pending a “major announcement”.
A statement sent to the SSE yesterday claimed: “Ingram Micro is an important, strategic investment project to the company and is a key cornerstone and asset to the company’s transformation and development.”
Ingram Micro said: “We have spoken with executives at HNA Group and Tianhai Investment who have confirmed that the trading halt in Tianhai Investment shares is not related to any plan to sell Ingram Micro.
“Per the HNA executives, Ingram Micro is a major strategic investment for HNA Group and a cornerstone in Tianhai Investment’s development and technology transformation.”
HNA acquired Ingram Micro for $6 billion in 2016.
Ingram Micro is expanding the automated services it can provide resellers to encourage more to sell cloud services
The idea is to encourage more partners to get involved with the hosted services market.
The improvements to the services follow changes to Ingram Micro’s Odin platform, which is now offering automated processes to reduce the complexity of providing hosted services. Odin was the Norse god of wisdom, who unfortunately was also one eyed and prone to hanging to get the sort of information he needed.
Ingram Micro is offering two options with its Automation Premium and Essentials packages. The first level combining automated processes with data analytics to help resellers keep an eye on what’s happening with their customers.
The essentials option gives the partner the chance to automate the purchasing, provisioning and reselling of cloud technology.
The distributor has launched a cloud referral programme and is generating pre-negotiation distribution agreements with pricing to speed things up for the channel.
Apay Obang-Oyway, director cloud & software, UK&I at Ingram Micro, said that all the expectations were for more spending around cloud and resellers needed to be supported in their efforts to capture some of that revenue.
With enterprises now saying that their cloud and hosting budgets are likely to grow more than their general IT spend in 2017, this is an opportune moment for partner organisations to grow a cloud business that can address their needs, he said.
Ingram Micro’s UK Cloud Summit was told that the channel has understood the opportunities that cloud can deliver.
The Summit was told that while the Channel was slow most now accept that the cloud is an unstoppable force changing business and their approach to the market.
Ingram Micro’s UK Cloud Summit heard from the distributor and vendors about the trends in the market.
Ingram Micro director of cloud & software UK&I Apay Obang-Oyway said that it was one of the first times that he had seen that the Channel has got the message and people were nodding their heads.
He cited Blockbuster, which failed to spot the streaming revolution until it was too late, as an example of the risks of not adapting to change.
“A lot of CEOs are petrified of being Blockbusted. A lot of partners can see the changes.”
He said the industry was at the start of the fourth industrial revolution and technologies including IoT, big data, social and cloud were driving those changes.
“While it is all very good and exciting it is bringing a lot of disruption, which you can look at negatively or positively. Within that there is a load of opportunity for channel partners but you have to understand this is a different reality and it is no longer business as usual, its business unusual. The opportunity is huge and represents significant numbers,” he added.
Worries about security have forced the delay of Ingram Micro’s take over by a Chinese outfit.
Ingram says that the deal, which would see it part of the Tianjin Tianhai Investment Company is now being delayed until towards the end of the year
The first delay to the deal came last month when the Shanghai Stock Exchange sent a letter to Tianjin Tianhai asking for more details about the takeover. In that case the Exchange was worried about how the deal was being funded.
But now the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States wants to take a close look at the deal.
“Ingram Micro today announced that the End Date by which the acquisition of Ingram Micro by Tianjin Tianhai Investment Company must be completed has been extended to November 13, 2016,” Ingram said.
Despite the CFIUS activity the expectation from both Ingram and on the Chinese side is that the deal will still close this year.
However it might not be that easy. The US is getting increasingly concerned about the involvement of the Chinese in business. Earlier this week it became clear that the Chinese company that is one of the main investors in the Hinkley Point nuclear power station is facing charges of nuclear espionage in the US.
Ingram Micro has signed up for Microsoft’s Surface as a service programme and launching its own version.
Under the deal, the distributor will be able to offer resellers in the UK the chance to provide Surface and the Microsoft suite along with the chance to take advantage of leasing options that should make it an easier decision for users.
Brian Windsor, senior business manager for Microsoft at Ingram Micro, said that it would be able to lean on its knowledge of the vendor’s software and hardware products.
“This offering will permit our resellers to assist their customer’s transformation to digital with ease. What’s more, we have strived to build our leasing options with recurring business in mind in order to maintain longevity of customer investment for our resellers,” he said.
Microsoft launched the programme last month. The big idea was to expand the number of partners that would be offering the same managed services approach. It is open to Cloud Solution Providers who are authorised Surface distributors and provides a managed service offering that can be taken out through resellers to users.
At the time Vole said that the Surface was having a real impact in the business market and Surface business has grown from generating $1bn in revenue in a year to $1bn in revenue per quarter.
“With our growing portfolio, we are creating not just great devices, but breakthrough categories that open up a world of new opportunities for partners to build capabilities in new areas, and to create solutions and services for customers. This year, we are investing in programs that increase partner revenue and profitability,” he added.
