HPE V4 Server and MS ROK Bundles PLUS $200...

HPE V4 Server and MS ROK Bundles PLUS$200 Visa Gift Card

Ingram Micro are bundling HPE Selected ProLiant Gen9 Servers with Microsoft Windows Server 2012 ROK PLUS $200 VISA Gift Card for your DL360v4, DL380v4 and ML350v4 server purchases!*

from Ingram Micro

CHANNEL | BUSINESS | TECHNOLOGY | COMMUNITY

OCTOBER 2016 | Vol. 21 No. 9OCTOBER 2016 | V lV 21 N 9OCTOBER 2016 | Vol.VV 21 No.NN 9

CONTRIBUTORS

BEAU ALDERSON

JACK ALSOP

JOHN ATHERTON

JOHN STUDLEY

JOHN WHYTE

MOE ALI

PIETER DEGUNST

ROB HARTNETT

SAM VOUKENAS

INTERVIEWS

AARON BAILEY

ALLAN KING

BEN LUCK

BILL FERGUSON

BOB DUTKOWSKY

DARREN ASHLEY

ELLEN DERRICK

LAURENCE BAYNHAM

MICHAEL JANOS

NATHAN LOWE

NICK MORAN

PAUL MEYER

RICHARD MARRISON

SACHIN VERMA

SREELESH PILLAI

KPMG – Sizing up the sectors

Vertical Visionaries

KPMG – Si

THE MISSING LINKSAYING NO IN FINANCE

DELOITTEPROBING THE PUBLIC SECTOR

Logon to au.ingrammicro.com | Call 1300 651 124Terms and Conditions: Bonus Server Configuration offer is valid 1 August – 31 October 2016, or while stocks last, whichever comes first. For every unit of 3101212, 3101213, 3101234 and 3101232 purchased the reseller is eligible to receive Server configuration at no extra cost. Reseller must add promotional code 3293822 to the same purchase order as the HPE ML30/DL20 server in order to receive the configuration service at $0.00. Configuration cannot be ordered separately to the Server. Configuration code 3293822 consists of; Installation of up to 5 HPE options into the server/san, DOA testing, Firmware updates, Raid configuration. All goods must be invoiced within the promotional period, no back orders, not for Retail. Promotion terms and conditions may be changed or varied at any time without notice. Ingram Micro Australia reserves the right to terminate the promotion in whole or in part at any time without prior notice and without liability. 7001463756 _180

Pay $0 for Server

*

824379-371 | IM SKU: 3101212 830893-371 | IM SKU: 3101213 829889-B21 | IM SKU: 3101234 823559-B21 | IM SKU: 3101232

HP ML30G9 E3-1220v5(1/1) 4GB(1/4) (0/4)-SATA-3.5-HP B140I TWR 3/1/1YR

HP ML30G9 E3-1240v5(1/1) 8GB(1/4) (0/4)-SATA-3.5-HP B140I TWR 3/1/1YR

HP DL20G9 G4400(1/1) 4GB(1/4) (0/2)-SATA-3.5-NHP B140I 1U 1/1/1YR

HP DL20G9 E3-1240v5(1/1) 8GB(1/4) (0/4)-SATA-2.5-NHP H240 1U 1/1/1YR

HP DL20G9 G4400(1/1) 4GB(1/4) (0/2)-SATA-3.5-NHPB140I 1U 1/1/1YR

HP DL20G9 E3-1240v5(1/1) 8GB(1/4) (0/4)-SATA-2.5-NHP H240 1U 1/1/1YR

30G9 E3-1220v 30G9 E3-1240v

increased compute performance across diverse workloads from SMB to scale-up environments.

Add promotional code to your purchase order

arnnet.com.au | OCTOBER 2016 |

CONTENTS 1

OctoberREGULARS

4 Editorial56 Secret Reseller60 Channel Coaching62 Community

COLUMNS

14 Gut or gigabytes? Analysing the impact of analytics As analytics continues to invade the enterprise,

PwC explains why Australia still remains in the

early stages of adoption.

38 Understanding the impact of the sharing economy Customers are rapidly turning into competitors.

Gartner asks - “Is your business prepared?”

54 Partner round-up – Coastal NSW LEON SPENCER explains why resellers are closer

to the customer in coastal New South Wales.

58 The Hot List HAFIZAH OSMAN looks at partners on the upward

move – these are the companies to watch.

ANALYSIS

12 Accentuate the vertical As IT buying moves up the chain to line of

business decisions, partners are in a position to

capitalise – LEON SPENCER reports.

40 Building a business continuity channel plan Back-up and business continuity are fundamental

in any business strategy – HAFIZAH OSMAN

examines how this translates in the channel.

44 Partner Perspective

ASI Solutions managing director, Nathan

Lowe, provides a partner perspective on how

the channel can maximise the need for greater

business continuity.

INTERVIEWS

10 ARN Hall of Fame – Laurence Baynham Fresh from being inducted into the ARN Hall of Fame, Data#3 CEO, Laurence Baynham, outlines

his route to the top with JAMES HENDERSON.

18 An enterprise approach to education Increased student demand is creating a

customer-orientated higher education

marketplace – KPMG Technology Advisory lead,

Richard Marrison assesses the impact with

HOLLY MORGAN.

22 Probing the Public Sector Technology deployments in government differ

from traditional private sector practices –

Deloitte Australia national consulting public

sector lead, Ellen Derrick, outlines the

differences to CHRIS PLAYER.

26 Why saying No builds trust in finance Saying ‘no’ to some of Australia’s largest

banks can be a good thing for technology

implementation partners – The Missing Link

security manager and director, Aaron Bailey,

explains why to LEON SPENCER.

30 A clean bill of channel health Today, healthcare represents a core part of the

channel arsenal for resellers – BEarena managing

director, Darren Ashley, documents its potential

to HAFIZAH OSMAN.

34 Tech Data in town... After years of speculation, Tech Data finally

signalled its intention to touch down on Australia

shores – Tech Data CEO, Bob Dutkowsky,

outlines to JAMES HENDERSON what makes the

distribution giant tick.

FEATURES

6 ARN ICT Industry Awards 2016 - Meet the winners… ARN honoured the industry’s finest on a landmark

evening for the Australian channel, as the tenth ARN ICT Industry Awards went off in style in Sydney.

46 How can partners maximise mobility? ARN recently assessed the channel’s most

lucrative mobility-orientated opportunities,

uncovering the art of creating viable mobile

strategies – HAFIZAH OSMAN reports.

2218

6

46

Hewlett Packard Enterprise LTO Drive and

Get $500 VISA Gift Card

Purchase your LTO Drives and Media

For a limited time Ingram Micro are rewarding customers with a $500 VISA Gift Card when they purchase over $5K of HPE LTO Drive and Media in one purchase order.*To help you get all the media you need, purchase 20 tapes for the price of 19. Check out the bundles and purchase today!

Logon to au.ingrammicro.com | Call 1300 651 124Terms and Conditions: Promotion valid till 31st October or while stocks last. Eligible purchases must be invoiced during the promotion period. No backorders will be counted towards this promotion. Ingram Micro, in its direction, may offer an alternative prize and/or a credit note as substitute for any prize, which may become unavailable during/after the promotion period. Ingram Micro reserves the right to change these terms and conditions and/or end this promotion earlier without notice. 7001287885_180

L t i i

Get a $500 VISA Gift card when you order LTO Drive and Media

$500

| OCTOBER 2016 | arnnet.com.au

4 EDITORIAL

Is the channel vertically challenged?

T raditionally, horizontal

sales ruled the channel

roost, with resellers selling

across markets to accountants,

dentists, retailers or even

governments.

In fact, the buyer didn’t matter

because irrespective of whether it

was manufacturing, education or

insurance industries, everyone was

a customer.

It’s a model that has served

the channel well for many years –

contributing to the rise of some of

the country’s leading resellers – but

today, the tide is turning.

The latest line of vendor

rhetoric advocates specialisation,

championing a channel that

focuses on a core market segment,

delivering tailored services on a

recurring basis.

The notion of “being everything

to everybody” is diminishing fast

in Australia, with those continuing

down the path of commoditisation

feeling the full brunt of industry

change.

But in stepping back from

the chaos, those that dig deeper,

naturally find the gold.

While it was easier to shift

products across a range of

industries, the services sell

requires a much deeper touch –

requiring partners to assemble

solutions unique to specific

market needs.

Tech DataMoving away from specialisation

and following years of speculation

and channel conjecture, the

inevitable finally happened – Tech

Data arrived in Australia.

Fresh from entering into

an agreement to acquire the

Technology Solutions business

from Avnet – in a transaction

valued at approximately $US2.6

billion – the deal represents the

tech giant’s first move into the

local market.

We caught up with Tech Data

CEO, Bob Dutkowsky, to provide an

early insight into what makes the

distribution giant tick, and whether

its arrival on Australian shores will

generate channel ripples across

the industry.

Celebrating historyFinally, this issue also

acknowledges history, following

the 10th running of the ARN ICT Industry Awards.

Nearly 700 of the industry’s

finest came together to celebrate

another year of achievements,

recognising the individuals

and the leading performers

across partner, distributor and

vendor categories.

Congratulations to all the

winners, highly commended

and finalists on the night, and

a special mention to ARN Hall of Fame inductees Laurence

Baynham, Angela Fox and

Dominic Whitehand.

James Henderson,Editor, ARN

Whether it through actually

speaking the language of that

industry, providing a complete suite

of applications and services or

developing consulting capabilities,

value is to be had from a vertical-

focused approach.

Outlined by a collection of four

in-depth interviews this month,

this issue shines a spotlight on the

vertical visionaries lighting up the

local channel.

Spanning KPMG, The Missing

Link, Deloitte and BEarena –

coupled with analyst reports and

insight – this issue zones in on the

key challenges and opportunities

within the core verticals of

education, government, health

and finance.

Our cover story this month

features KPMG Technology

Advisory lead, Richard Marrison,

who explains the advantage of

partners adopting an enterprise

approach to education, with tertiary

establishments now asking – “how

can we keep a customer for life?”

The nuances of government are

also highlighted through Deloitte

Australia national consulting public

sector lead, Ellen Derrick, who

outlines the challenges of public

scrutiny, multiple stakeholders and

vision alignment when deploying

technology projects.

In finance, The Missing Link

security manager and director,

Aaron Bailey, documents why

saying no to banks helps build

greater levels of trust, and BEarena

managing director, Darren Ashley,

analyses the core demands of

customers in healthcare.

“Those that dig deeper, naturally find the gold”

The one device that’s every device

1

hp.com/go/elitex3

HP Elite x3

Built for business

3

Total securityTravels light, docks large

2


6

ARN honoured the industry’s finest on a landmark evening for the Australian channel, as the tenth ARN ICT Industry Awards went off in style in Sydney. Photos by Maria Stefina and Yulia Photography.

ARN ICT Industry Awards 2016 ARN AWARDS – WINNERS LIST

Vendor Awards

HARDWARE VENDOR OF THE YEARWINNER: LENOVOHIGHLY COMMENDED: HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES / NIMBLE STORAGE

SOFTWARE VENDOR OF THE YEARWINNER: VMWAREHIGHLY COMMENDED: CITRIX

SPECIALIST VENDOR OF THE YEARWINNER: VEEAM SOFTWAREHIGHLY COMMENDED: F5

SECURITY VENDOR OF THE YEARWINNER: FIREEYEHIGHLY COMMENDED: TREND MICRO

NETWORKING VENDOR OF THE YEARWINNER: CISCOHIGHLY COMMENDED: HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES

Distributor Awards

HARDWARE DISTRIBUTOR OF THE YEARWINNER: DICKER DATAHIGHLY COMMENDED: DISTRIBUTION CENTRAL

SOFTWARE DISTRIBUTOR OF THE YEARWINNER: RHIPEHIGHLY COMMENDED: DICKER DATA

SPECIALIST DISTRIBUTOR OF THE YEARWINNER: NEXTGENHIGHLY COMMENDED: EXCLUSIVE NETWORKS

BEST DISTRIBUTOR INITIATIVE OF THE YEARWINNER: AVNETHIGHLY COMMENDED: DISTRIBUTION CENTRAL

Meet the winners...


7

Partner Awards

ENTERPRISE PARTNER OF THE YEARWINNER: DATA#3HIGHLY COMMENDED: THOMAS DURYEA CONSULTING

MID-MARKET PARTNER OF THE YEARWINNER: BRENNAN ITHIGHLY COMMENDED: ASI SOLUTIONS

SMB PARTNER OF THE YEARWINNER: ENERDSHIGHLY COMMENDED: XCENTRAL

BEST PARTNER PERFORMANCE INITIATIVE OF THE YEARWINNER: STAPLES TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS

Personal Innovation

CHANNEL EXCELLENCE OF THE YEARWINNER: GEOFF WRIGHT (DELL EMC)HIGHLY COMMENDED: STEPHANIE MCFADDEN (WESTCON-COMSTOR)

SALES EXCELLENCE OF THE YEARWINNER: MARISA NEWHAM (DATACOM)HIGHLY COMMENDED: GRANT SAMUELS (MEXIA)

TECHNICAL EXCELLENCE OF THE YEARWINNER: STEVE HICKEY (WESTCON-COMSTOR)HIGHLY COMMENDED: IAN WELCH (DICKER DATA)

MANAGEMENT EXCELLENCE OF THE YEARWINNER: DAVID NICOL (CITRIX)HIGHLY COMMENDED: ANGELA CORONICA (CISCO)

Community Awards

SUSTAINABILITYWINNER: APC BY SCHNEIDER ELECTRICHIGHLY COMMENDED: HP

CORPORATE CITIZENSHIPWINNER: MICROSOFTHIGHLY COMMENDED: IBM

CHANNEL CHAMPIONWINNER: NICK VERYKIOS (DISTRIBUTION CENTRAL)HIGHLY COMMENDED: BELINDA JURISIC (CITRIX)


8

Telecommunications Awards

VENDOR OF THE YEARWINNER: SHORETELHIGHLY COMMENDED: CISCO / MITEL

DISTRIBUTOR OF THE YEARWINNER: DISTRIBUTION CENTRAL

PARTNER OF THE YEARWINNER: OPTUS BUSINESSHIGHLY COMMENDED: BIGAIR GROUP

BEST TELECOMMUNICATIONS INITIATIVE OF THE YEARWINNER: NEXTDCHIGHLY COMMENDED: NEXON

Homegrown Innovators

SERVICE PROVIDER OF THE YEARWINNER: CLOUD PLUSHIGHLY COMMENDED: NEXTDC

ISV OF THE YEARWINNER: ARTIS GROUPHIGHLY COMMENDED: HUBONE

START UP OF THE YEARWINNER: SIXPIVOTHIGHLY COMMENDED: ADACTIN GROUP / INFOTRUST

Cloud Computing Awards

VENDOR OF THE YEARWINNER: AMAZON WEB SERVICESHIGHLY COMMENDED: MICROSOFT

PARTNER OF THE YEARWINNER: KLOUD SOLUTIONSHIGHLY COMMENDED: BRENNAN IT

BEST CLOUD INITIATIVE OF THE YEARWINNER: MICROSOFTHIGHLY COMMENDED: AMAZON WEB SERVICES

Channel Choice Awards

HARDWARE VENDOR: HEWLETT PACKARD ENTERPRISESOFTWARE VENDOR: BARRACUDA NETWORKSDISTRIBUTOR: INGRAM MICROPARTNER: DATA#3

Hall Of Fame Inductees

ANGELA FOXLAURENCE BAYNHAMDOMINIC WHITEHAND

A thin and sleek

The HP Elite x2

hp.com/go/elitex21012


10

Fresh from being inducted into the ARN Hall of Fame, Data#3 CEO, Laurence Baynham, outlines his route to the top with James Henderson.

Leading from within…


Laurence Baynham

10 HALL OF FAME/LAURENCE BAYNHAM

Photos by Maria Stefina


In the heart of central London, Marylebone to be precise, a young Laurence Baynham earned

his stripes.Scuttling between Harley Street

and Wimpole Street, Baynham worked his two-street patch as a budding young salesman, servicing the thriving healthcare industry in his first professional sales role, for office equipment multinational Pitney Bowes.

“I made 40 face-to-face calls a day and achieved my target in my first year,” recalled Baynham, looking back on the early days of his working life.

In providing the foundation for a career in sales, Baynham entered the technology scene in 1985, selling accounting software to small businesses across London.

“I remember the main attraction of ICT was the higher level of professionalism and higher earnings,” he said.

“But I saw my career in sales rather than technology. I have never seen myself as a technologist but I can help organisations apply technology to gain a business outcome.

“ICT is such a fast paced industry and every year is different.”

Canadian-born, a young Baynham

relocated to New York before his first birthday, growing up in the Big Apple before moving to the UK aged ten.

But in joining the ICT industry in the year that the first British mobile phone calls were made, and Apple’s original MacIntosh took the world by storm, in 1985, Baynham took the first steps of a career that would span over 30 years and more than 16,000km.

Arriving on Australian shores in 1991, the Data#3 CEO became a citizen “very soon after”, raising his young family in the sunshine state of Queensland.

“My wife Katharine and I had a young family with two girls under two and we believed that Australia was a better place to raise a family,” he said.

“This has proved to be the case and we added another three sons whilst living in Brisbane. We would never have considered five children living in London.”

In joining the system integrator three years later, the Data#3 of 1994 differed greatly to that of 2016, with less than 100 employees and approximately $20 million revenue.

“The growth that we have experienced has been phenomenal,” he recalled. “There has never been a dull moment.

“Looking ahead, my immediate ambitions are to continue to grow and transition Data#3 into an increasingly services centric business.

“But on a personal note, I have

an interest in corporate governance and over the long-term will seek to help other organisations as a non-executive director.”

In parallel with the success of one of Australia’s leading technology providers, the industry veteran has risen through the ranks to shine equally alongside, forging out a reputation as a well-respected figure within the channel.

Fresh from taking the top role in 2014, Baynham has nudged the business towards a billion dollars in revenue, overseeing a workforce of 1100 staff, across eight offices nationwide.

While Baynham won’t sing it from the rooftops - such is his preference to honour his army of workers - the

affable leader has played a pivotal role in expanding a one-time Queensland orientated reseller into a high-performing ASX-listed ICT provider, steering his company through a period of great industry change.

Bringing Data#3 to the top table ranks highly among Baynham’s growing list of achievements, but it’s a different type of success that provides equal reward for the much-travelled leader.

After being named Australia’s Best Company in the 2016 Employer of Choice Awards for the Human Resources Director (HRD) magazine, Baynham’s leadership was once again recognised by the wider industry, reflective of the core cultures that stand up Data#3 today.

During his tenure, and in keeping with tradition, Baynham has fostered a culture built on five core values, spanning honesty, excellence, agility, respect and teamwork (HEART).

Renowned for his business acumen and generous spirit, industry colleagues insist that Baynham represents the true meaning of his company’s motto - displaying strength, stability and innovation in equal measure.

“Leaders don’t need to be the CEO or senior managers,” he said. “At Data#3 we have many excellent leaders who are not necessarily managers.

“Some qualities of leaders that I admire are vision, humility, honesty, integrity, respect and the ability to listen. Great leaders demonstrate these traits every day.”

It’s such traits that has made Baynham - in his own unique way – a leading figure within the Australian channel.

“I have never seen myself as a technologist but I can help organisations apply technology to gain a

business outcome”

LAURENCE BAYNHAM /HALL OF FAME 11


12 ANALYSIS/VERTICALS

G iven today’s fast-evolving

technology market, the assertion

that digital disruption is leading

to potent increases in IT spend across

the board is a bit like telling a fish that

water is wet; it’s not news to anybody even

marginally involved in the local enterprise

technology landscape.

Dive a little deeper into the pond

however, and trends in how technology

investment is increasing – where the

greatest amount of new spend is going,

how it is being allocated, and where it is

growing most rapidly – reveals a great deal

about just how industry is evolving thanks

to technological change.

IT investment continues to grow. At

the same time, the organisational level at

which technology buy-in is decided has

been ascending, with business executives

increasingly displacing IT executives as

primary technology buyers. These factors

present a new and changing landscape to

partners, filled with emerging opportunities.

According to Gartner, enterprise IT

investment across all industry segments in

Australia is predicted to grow by almost two

per cent during the course of 2015-2016,

to $US80.3 billion for the year.

Globally, the figure for this year alone

stands at about $US2.4 trillion, according

to fellow research group, IDC.

IDC research suggests that, by 2020,

worldwide revenue from IT products and

services is set to hit $US2.7 trillion or more,

representing a compound annual growth

rate (CAGR) of 3.3 per cent over 2015-2020.

Big industry areas such as financial

services and manufacturing are slated

to see positive momentum in IT spend,

according to IDC forecasts, especially

where companies are spending more on

so-called 3rd Platform technology, such as

cloud, mobility, and big data.

Meanwhile, banking, discrete

manufacturing, process manufacturing, and

telecommunications comprise the industries

with the largest IT spend. Combined, they are

also expected to generate close to a third

of worldwide revenues over the period of

IDC’s forecast to 2020.

Healthcare is set to retain its crown

as the fastest-growing industry sector,

with five-year CAGR of 5.7 per cent over

ACCENTUATE THE VERTICAL

As IT buying moves up the chain to line of business decisions within enterprise and

government entities, partners are in a position to increasingly capitalise on industry vertical

specialisation and sector-based competitive differentiation – Leon Spencer reports.


VERTICALS/ANALYSIS 13

and department users alongside the chief

information officer’s (CIO’s) office.

“Our research shows more than half

of employees in current line of business

are involved in IT procurement process,

which implies that sellers now need to craft

messaging that resonates with these new

influencers and buyers,” Gartner reported.

Far from creating havoc for partners

in the channel, this trend may, in fact,

be a force for good, with resellers in a

position to make the most of the new,

evolving dynamic.

According to Gartner, having a

“verticalised” market strategy is strongly

correlated to gaining greater access

to business buying centres in targeted

vertical markets.

“Successful vertical differentiation is a

business and operating model choice, not a

marketing choice,” Gartner reported. “Not

all technology providers will benefit from

greater verticalisation, but the approach

adopted needs to be a considered decision.”

Never one to miss an opportunity,

Gartner has, of course, formulated a

framework that technology providers can

use to help tackle industry verticals.

According to its ‘Vertical Strategy

Framework’, Gartner recommends five

clear postures that partners can choose

between to help gain traction in a chosen

industry sector: industry aware; industry

entrant; industry associate; industry peer;

and industry influencer.

Within this framework, Gartner suggests

five parameters that help to determine the

business and operating model decisions

that comprise a vertical strategy.

These include organisation,

segmentation, targeting and positioning,

product development, sales and

distribution and service and delivery.

While Gartner’s recommendations may,

at first glance, appear somewhat convoluted,

the long and short of it for partners is this:

providers should understand the business

decisions that drive technology investment

in the enterprise, position themselves to

exploit that knowledge, and implement a

strategy to tap into today’s business needs.

“Adopting a vertical-market approach

forces providers to consider their offerings

in a business context, and provides an

opportunity to help their clients drive

competitive differentiation and achieve

industry-specific business goals,” the

Gartner report said.

No doubt, most

partners already

have some form

of vertical strategy

built into how they

do business.

The trick,

according to

Gartner, is in

how partners go about identifying the

opportunities and formulating a plan to

take advantage of them.

In this issue, ARN takes a closer look

at four technology partners operating

in Australia that are making a point of

focusing on particular industry verticals – a

strategy that has resulted in dividends.

For Deloitte, the public sector plays a big

part in the work it does within Australia, while

the education sector is a regular customer

for KPMG, with the company making a point

of ramping up its focus on the vertical.

At the same time, the financial services

sector is an important revenue driver for

The Missing Link. Likewise, BEarena has

seen lucrative opportunities abound from

the healthcare sector.

It’s not so much that these companies

have chosen just one vertical on which to

focus. They haven’t. Rather, they have taken

the time and effort to get to know certain

verticals well, building on the strengths

needed to become leading players within

particular industry sectors.

As IT investment decisions continue

to migrate from the IT office to other

departments within the enterprise, vertical

specialisation helps partners to develop

a new lexicon, a greater understanding of

business needs, and a more refined view of

how to develop solutions to meet them.

2015-2020, while banking, media, and

professional services are expected to, as

a group, experience a CAGR of around

4.9 per cent for the period, to more than

$US475 billion in 2020.

“While the consumer and public sectors

have dragged on overall IT spending so

far in 2016, we see stronger momentum

in other key industries including financial

services and manufacturing,” IDC

customer insights and analysis vice

president, Stephen Minton, said.

“Enterprise investment in new project-

based initiatives,

including data

analytics and

collaborative

applications,

remains strong,

and mid-sized

companies have

been especially

nimble when it comes to rapidly

adopting third platform technologies

and solutions.”

Closer to home, Gartner has identified

the combined communications, media, and

services sector as the highest-spending

market vertical in Australia – this is

followed closely by manufacturing and

natural resources, and the banking and

securities sectors.

However, the fastest-growing segment

for technology spending in Australia

this year is set to be the utilities sector,

according to the industry research company.

These figures are not surprising. Every

industry sector, according to Gartner, has

embarked on digital technology adoption as a

response to internal pressures to transform.

This is in addition to changing demands

and expectations among end customers. It

should be noted, however, that the pace of

change among differing industry verticals

varies dramatically.

“The pervasiveness of technology in all

industries, some more than others, has

made it crucial to focus on IT spending

across verticals,” stated Gartner in its

Forecast Overview: Enterprise IT Spending

Across Vertical Industries report.

Most importantly, Gartner believes

that IT buying is moving well beyond the

back-end, and now involves the business

“Successful vertical differentiation is a business and operating model choice,

not a marketing choice”

2016 |

VERTICALS/ANALYSIS 13

the long and short of it for partners is this:

providers should understand the business

decisions that drive technology investment

in the enterprise, position themselves to

exploit that knowledge, and implement a

strategy to tap into today’s business needs.

“Adopting a vertical-market approach

rces providers to consider their offerings

a business context, and provides an

portunity to help their clients drive

petitive differentiation and achieve

stry-specific business goals,” the

er report said.

No doubt, most

partners already

have some form

of vertical strategy

built into how they

do business.

The trick,

according to

Gartner, is in

s go about identifying the

and formulating a plan to

e of them.

e, ARN takes a closer look Nogy partners operating

are making a point of

cular industry verticals – a

resulted in dividends.

e public sector plays a big

oes within Australia, while

r is a regular customer

ompany making a point

us on the vertical.

the financial services

revenue driver for

wise, BEarena has

ities abound from

hese companies

cal on which to

r, they have taken

know certain

e strengths

ayers within

continue

other

ise, vertical

develop

nding of

ed view of

hem.

ce,


14 ANALYSIS/PWC

As analytics continues to invade the enterprise, Australian still remains in the early stages of adoption - James Henderson reports.

A ustralian organisations

are using data analytics

retrospectively to see what

has gone wrong and why, but gut

instinct still trumps gigabytes when

it comes to determining what actions

should be taken in future.

Findings from PwC’s Global Data and Analytics survey 2016 shows that

Australian organisations across

all industries trail behind global

peers in using predictive analytics to

understand what will or could happen

and prescriptive analytics to determine

what should happen and how.

Only 25 per cent of businesses

locally use analytics to predict and

prescribe what actions to take in

future compared to 42 per cent on

average globally.

Instead, 73 per cent of Australian

organisations still primarily use

analytics to ‘look back’ and understand

what has happened and why,

compared to 55 per cent globally.

Chinese organisations –

increasingly seen as role models

of digital innovation – are twice as

likely as Australian organisations

to use data analytics in planning for

the future, with 50 per cent of Chinese

organisations using predictive and

prescriptive analytics to determine

what actions should be taken in future.

“Many Australian organisations

have strong pockets of analytics

ability and use this to diagnose

a problem after an event has

happened,” PwC lead partner data

and analytics, John Studley, said.

“But their slow embrace of

predictive analytics means they are

failing to use this ability to steer

“There is more we can know, and fewer assumptions we have to make”

Executives still relying on gut, not gigabytes when future planning

their course and innovate.

“This is because too many

Australian organisations are chained

to static, backward looking reports.

An easy win is smarter visualisation.

“The greatest value of a picture is

when it forces us to notice something

that we never expected to see.”

Mind versus machineWhen it comes to the type of analysis

that will inform their next big decision,

most Australian organisations rely

primarily on human judgment rather

than machine algorithms (62 per

cent vs 59 per cent globally).

As explained by Studley, this is most

pronounced in Japan where 69 per

cent rely on human judgement, but

the opposite is true for China, with 56

per cent of businesses believing that

analysis will rely more on machines.

Delving deeper, two-thirds (61 per

cent) of organisations acknowledge

the benefits of relying on data

analysis more and intuition less.

“Most Australian companies are

still on the cusp of change – aware

of the machine power at hand, yet

clinging to a status quo that relies on

decision cultures based on intuition

and past experiences,” Studley added.

Yet for Studley, the case for

change is simple.

“The brightest or most

experienced person can only grapple

with three or four influencing

factors, whereas a machine can

calculate a probability distribution

and make the optimal decision

mathematically,” he explained.

Studley said the right mix of

mind and machine can help reduce

the impact of human bias and yield

more accurate answers, even for

complex problems.

“There is more we can know,

and fewer assumptions we have to

make,” he added.

“That doesn’t eliminate the critical

need for human judgement, but it does

require leaders to disrupt their cultures

so that their organisations can better

collaborate with and benefit from the

opportunities machines offer.”

Yet across the country, Studley

said budget constraints (36 per cent)

and leadership courage (26 per cent)

are limiting the use and application of

analytics by Australian organisations.

“Australian organisations aren’t

walking the talk on analytic data

innovation because they lack the

structures and mind-sets to bring

these to life,” he added.

“To foster a culture of analytics

capability and innovation,

business leaders should grow

data capability, cultivate an open,

transparent and test-and-learn

culture and leverage pockets of

analytics across the business.”

DATA IS A ROCK STAR.IF NOT MANAGED WELL IT WILL TRASH THE PLACE.

It’s time for better control.IT’S TIME FOR VERITAS.

Curb unstructured data growth. Determine what information holds actual business value to your organisation and cut away the data holding it back. Veritas solutions help you take the action your business needs.

Take control of your data at veritas.com/aa

© 2

016

Ver

itas

Tech

nolo

gies

LLC

. All

right

s re

serv

ed.

18 EDUCATION/KPMG

Richard Marrison – KPMG




KPMG/EDUCATION 19

Traditionally, the lifespan of a student was three to four years, with the path to university

graduation both short and simple.But with over 1.4 million domestic

and international students now enrolled in higher education across Australia, tertiary institutions are fighting to keep such prized assets.

“Education establishments are now asking – how can we keep a customer for life?” KPMG head of technology advisory, Richard Marrison, observed.

“They want to know how they can formulate a service that is personalised and tailored to that customer, which allows them to consume it through multiple channels.

“The education sector is commercialising and this is very much a corporate mentality.”

Such a corporate approach to education is now commonplace across the Australian sector, with technological tidal waves creating a commercial mindset at a national level.

While the art of turning a one-time buyer into a customer for life isn’t new, in education, momentum is building.

In predicting a “snowball effect” within the next three to five years, Marrison believes new digital delivery models will enable Australia’s largest tertiary institutions to capitalise on new business opportunities across the vertical.

“This concept of ‘service’ is government talk but it’s how the

industry is talking within education now also,” Marrison added. “It’s not about a citizen. It’s not about a student. It’s about a customer.

“We are seeing some of the large Australian universities spend hundreds of millions of dollars on technology change.

“But if you sit outside the sector, you would never think a

university would spend a hundred million dollars on a technology change program.”

In the business world, customer service is a prized commodity, one that directly impacts the bottom line.

The same can now be seen in education, as universities realise that if students stay with an institution longer, such loyalty builds a barrier to competition, meaning greater consumption and increased sales.

“Universities want a commercial relationship with an individual all the way through their working life and beyond because they are going to be in a constant state of retraining,” Marrison explained.

As digital transformation dictates Australian business priorities, Marrison believes that the requirements of the modern day workforce is changing alongside, creating a need for new skills and competencies.

Increased student demand is creating a customer-orientated higher education marketplace – KPMG Technology Advisory lead, Richard Marrison, assesses the impact with Holly Morgan.

“An individual may have completed a maths undergraduate degree, but then they may move into technology and then they may move into marketing,” he explained.

“Who knows where people will move in the future – it all depends on what the workforce demands.

“The concept of education, particularly higher education, of being

a place where you have to attract the best and brightest at the age of 18, keep them for three or four

years and then part company with them is changing dramatically.”

Customer expansionIn light of dramatic market change, KPMG has also altered its approach in accordance with industry shifts, deepening its education play during the past few years.

Historically, the consulting giant hasn’t been “active” within the education vertical, yet as new technologies infiltrate the workforce, Marrison acknowledged that the sector as a whole has “woken up” to the opportunity in keeping a “customer for life”.

In regional Australia, away from the hustle and bustle of city life, enrolment levels are decreasing slightly, down 1.6 per cent compared to a national rise of 2.7 per cent.

But as Marrison explained, the need to widen the customer base extends past Australian shores, and into the lucrative Asia Pacific region.

A N ENTERPRISEA P P R O A C H T O E D U C A T I O N

“The education sector is commercialising and this is very much a corporate mentality”


20 EDUCATION/KPMG

“They need to use the data available to them to constantly maintain a relationship.

“During the old era, students never actually updated their details and universities never reached out to force this, but this is changing.

“Now universities want to form a relationship with LinkedIn for example, and are asking providers if they can use the functionality of a CRM application that scrapes LinkedIn to constantly refresh contact details within the alumni.”

AdvisoryAlongside the technological demands placed on partners, Marrison said KPMG is now providing a broad array of services within the education space, focused on strategic planning and governance arrangements.

But to effectively sell to the sector, Marrison advised partners to draw on experience from advising across other verticals, emphasising the importance of delivering pragmatic industry know-how to end-users in education.

“You need to actually have the war stories and the scars to bring that to life,” he said.

“You also require an understanding of the broader environment because education is no different to banking or to consumer goods in that you need to understand the political landscape, the regulatory landscape and the global landscape.”

In Australia, and specific to the channel, Marrison said that in 2016, it’s “highly unrealistic” for partners to be operating across multiple verticals.

Rather, a technology advisor must be specialised to provide valuable advice in specific sectors.

“Educators want to talk to other educators and bankers want to talk to other bankers,” he said.

“This is because they see themselves first and foremost as an industry specialist. You are dealing with a very particular climate with the education sector.

“First and foremost you’ve got very distinct stakeholder groups and you’ve got the executive leadership who are a pretty commercial group of individuals.

“They are paid well, they have extensive experience and they are normally running another big business somewhere else – they are CEO material.”

In light of such CEO material running the education sector today, a new approach is now required, specifically from the partners selling into it.

“Australian universities see a lot of their future customers as being based across the region,” he observed. “Strategies and financial success is now premised upon universities attracting a share of the Asian market.

“Why does someone living in Jakarta need to relocate to Australia for four years to complete their degree? It’s very expensive and cuts out a lot of customers because they can’t service that customer base economically and at a price point that works for the student.

“This is now the language of education and it’s exactly the same as the world of corporates.

“How can you provide the service of education at a price point that works for a customer base that you currently can’t reach?”

TechnologiesIn keeping with a business-focused approach – and the need to attract a wider pool of customers – Marrison said institutions are deepening engagement with the channel, driven by the need to deploy enterprise-grade technologies.

Consequently, Australian universities are calling on KPMG to implement customer relationship management (CRM) tools that are fit for business, supported by strong digital marketing strategies.

“Universities now want leading edge student management systems to engage appropriately with their customers,” Marrison added.

“Universities want a commercial relationship with an individual all the way through their

working life and beyond because they are going to be in a constant state of retraining”

SYDNEY MELBOURNE

Contact our dedicated Team Today:[email protected] or 61 (2) 9381 6000ingramcloudconnection.com.au

SPONSORS

ingramcloudconnection.com.au


Technology deployments in government differ from traditional private sector practices - Deloitte Australia national consulting public sector lead, Ellen Derrick, explains the differences to Chris Player.

Probing the Public Sector

Ellen Derrick - Deloitte

The entire government contract portfolio - spanning maintenance,

implementation, consulting, advisory and managed services – represents the holy grail for the Australian channel.

Yet interacting with the public sector is a complex and bureaucratic beast, with providers facing an uphill battle – coupled with a steep learning curve – when responding to tenders.

In drawing on over 20 years of public sector experience, Deloitte Australia national consulting public sector lead, Ellen Derrick, believes new digitally driven agendas in government presents ongoing opportunities for the channel around advisory, integration and managed services.

“But partners must be mindful when securing lucrative government contracts of the differences between dealing with the public sector as opposed to private enterprise,” Derrick said.

Despite cut-throat competition dominating both sectors, Derrick advised that key distinctions should be made when distinguishing public business from private.

22 GOVERNMENT/DELOITTE



DELOITTE/GOVERNMENT 23

Traditionally, the majority of government IT systems were siloed, yet through the adoption of cloud-first strategies among many internal departments – in parallel with increased digital transformation initiatives – such disparate environments are beginning to find a point of parity.

In aiding the delivery of strategic policy outcomes, Derrick observed that today, government departments across the country have a new appetite for emerging technologies, in particular cloud.

Previously, government would design and build infrastructure that was fit for purpose, with such strategy now reserved for security forces and divisions holding sensitive

data, such as the Department of Finance.

Cloud-first policiesUpon the release of a Cloud Computing Policy in October 2014, data showed only modest use of cloud services by government agencies at the time.

Two years later and cloud first policies have become the new norm across many areas of the Australian public sector, and while the majority of infrastructure remains on premise, Derrick said new deployments are now directed skyward.

“There’s a real appetite for cloud,” Derrick observed. “The advancements in the technology have made it an attractive proposition for the public sector.”

Such appetite is playing out across government with departments traditionally bound by the build camp now edging towards a cloud first strategy, illustrated by the Australian Tax Office (ATO) moving to Amazon Web Services (AWS).

Originally planned as a reinvention of the agency’s digital technology program through to 2020, the department has now moved mission critical applications to the public cloud with the help of Accenture and IBM.

Due to the scale at which government operates at however,

Derrick insisted that the threshold for failure is low, with numerous stakeholders ensuring a rollout takes typically longer than in enterprise, which operates based on a more autocratic model.

When advising the public sector, Derrick said partners encounter the policies of line agencies – those which deal with the primary function of the department – alongside ministerial priorities, which often fail to add up.

“Large ICT enabled transformations normally involve multiple stakeholders, including multiple agencies, ministers, jurisdictions, end

users and their representative groups and many operational staff,” Derrick said.

“It depends on the scale of the transformation but often the biggest challenge in achieving outcomes is keeping stakeholders aligned to the vision.

“Unlike the private sector, because there are many stakeholders there is rarely a single decision maker – and it is important to keep alignment across stakeholders – so you see a more consensual style to delivery and decision making than you would see in the private sector.”

Once decisions are reached however, particularly in cloud, Derrick insisted that government preference is based around replying as soon as possible, while taking into account any setbacks or failures.

“There is a policy of fail fast,” Derrick added.

Public scrutinyOnce the slogan of the budding entrepreneur, and now adopted by the enterprise, the failing fast mantra of many represents a double edged sword for public sector departments.

Given the visibility of the deals to the public, and the subsequent impact on citizenry, Derrick cautioned that such an approach to business can create greater scrutiny than private sector deployments.

A quick glance at the technology and mainstream media last month provides the most recent example of a government ICT policy falling under intense public criticism, following the IBM census debacle in August.

“Often the biggest challenge in achieving outcomes is keeping stakeholders aligned to the vision”


24 GOVERNMENT/DELOITTE

After winning the $9.6 million contract from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) in 2014 – to design, develop and implement the online census – Big Blue has been directly blamed by government for its role in allowing four distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks to take down the country’s online census service.

As the only non-government entity involved, the tech giant was taken to task by Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, who fiercely insisted “heads would roll” following the technology collapse.

A matter of weeks later, two senior IBM staff in Australia “resigned with immediate effect”, emphasising the technological tight rope that connects success with failure in government.

PartnershipsAcross Australia, the public sector relies heavily on cooperation with business for delivering IT projects, but also leans on partners to deliver the essential skills lacking in-house.

While a lack of deep expertise and resources isn’t unique to government, public sector organisations by definition typically possess greater capacity to employ specialist skills compared to enterprise.

But no single entity can possess all the skills required for ongoing digital transformation, leaving partnership as a crucial component in the delivery of public sector technology projects.

As Prime Minister, Turnbull recently called for a rethink in the way services are deployed, insisting he remained “very sceptical” about government outsourcing IT services to large system integrators that deliver less than first promised.

“That's why, as Prime Minister, I set up the Digital Transformation Office within government,” outlined Turnbull, during an appearance on ABC Q&A in June.

“That is to be an agency to operate like a start-up with the innovative edge of a start-up but to revive and renew government online services

from within government, rather than just signing big contracts with big systems – you know, private companies, big system integrators.

“What we have to do is ensure that you bring government into the 21st century, government services into the 21st century and you don't do that solely by pushing them all out the door so that there is nothing left inside government.

“There is a lot of innovation that can be done in government if you provide the right leadership and the right culture.”

But as Derrick qualified, while the issue of developing IT skills within government remains high on the agenda, it’s not black and white.

“It’s not a matter of simply having deployments done by the public sector or by government,” Derrick explained.

“There would always be collaboration at some level no matter how advanced government departments become at digital transformation.”

For Derrick, the consumer experience of citizens, through mobile banking and eCommerce applications, has driven many to expect similar levels of interaction within government agencies.

“You hear this directly from Malcolm Turnbull or any agency,” Derrick added. “Consumers expect the same experience when they transact with government as they get when they use their banking app or order an Uber – it should be that simple and easy.”

“There’s a real appetite for cloud”

Everyone is talking transformation, but few people know how. Leave yesterday’s problems behind when you partner with HPE and Arrow ECS ANZ on a journey that will change your tomorrow.

HPE’s Synergy is changing the way technology solves business problems, and partnered with Arrow ECS ANZ’s channel support model – Land, Expand, Extend, Protect® – HPE’s partners have all the technology solutions, tools, services and systems you need to change your customer’s tomorrow.

[email protected] 673 506


26 FINANCE/THE MISSING LINK

Sometimes it’s okay to just say ‘no’.

Just ask The Missing Link security manager and director, Aaron Bailey, who often finds himself in the unenviable position of telling some of Australia’s largest financial institutions that, actually, no, they can’t have exactly what they want.

But for Bailey, it’s all part of building a deeper level of trust between provider and end-user.

Whether it be one of the country’s Big Four banks - The Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA), Westpac, National Australia Bank (NAB) or ANZ – there’s value in the channel standing firm when advising on technology infrastructure deals.

“If we want their trust, we can’t just be yes men agreeing with them all the time,” Bailey said.

“Has there ever been conflict? Yes but you’ve got to say, ‘I don’t believe in that direction you’re going in, I think your money’s better spent over here’, or, ‘I don’t believe in that technology choice, and here are the reasons why’.”

Bailey said such conversations arise from “time to time” in the boardrooms of mega banking institutions, due to the large internal technology teams and internally-driven projects impacting discussions.

“You’ve got to have integrity in what you do, and you’ve got to believe in what you do. Otherwise, why are you doing it?.”

For the Big Four banks propping up Australia’s financial market, enterprise technology represents a major investment, with security infrastructure viewed as a serious business.

CBA alone spent just under $1.5 billion in information and technology services for the year ending June 2016, with application maintenance and development gobbling up $511 million of that, and data processing taking $197 million for the year.

While CBA doesn’t habitually break down its technology

investment into application type in its public financial documents, a large proportion of its tech investment for 2016 would have been pumped into security, according to Bailey.

Combined, the country’s Big Four invest over $3.5 billion on technology infrastructure and services annually, with CBA spending the most out of the gang.

“Banks are fairly paranoid about security,” Bailey observed. “They will spend a lot of time, money, and people making sure that something is secure.”

This is where The Missing Link enter the discussion, with

Technology investmentsSpecifically, banks such as CBA employ top field experts to work with internal staff to drive technology decision making from the inside.

But on the outside, so does The Missing Link, with this clash of experts causing the potential to give rise to dissenting voices between partner and customer.

“It’s just an opinion at the end of the day,” he said. “We’ve gained our opinion having people who have worked in security for their whole lives, in a number of different places for different clients as technology has evolved over

15 years in the space – we have a professional opinion, as do others.”

On occasions, Bailey said such internally-driven visions have prompted some end-users to walk away from deals, and instead seek other implementation partners that are open to aligning with internal strategies.

But more often than not, they return equipped with the knowledge that Bailey and his team act on what is best for the company and its stakeholders.

“Yes, we may lose a project, but not a client,” Bailey said. “I don’t think we’ve ever lost a client doing that.

Pushing back on some of Australia’s largest banks can be a good thing for technology implementation partners - The Missing Link security manager and director, Aaron Bailey, explains why to Leon Spencer.

WHY SAYING NO BUILDS TRUST IN FINANCE

“If we want their trust, we can’t just be yes men agreeing with them all the time”


THE MISSING LINK/FINANCE 27


Aaron Bailey – The Missing Link


28 FINANCE/THE MISSING LINK

In searching for the cutting edge security technologies of the future, The Missing Link continually invests in new and emerging solutions such as cloud access security broker (CASB) and security incident event management (SIEM), alongside keeping pace with best industry practices.

“Otherwise we have no strategic value to our existing vendors,” he said. “And, remember, the vendors aren’t sitting still either.”

Bailey said The Missing Link recently completed its Council for Registered Ethical Security Testers (CREST) certification, with the federal government-mandated certification essentially freeing up the company to hack their clients – ethically.

Unsurprisingly, at least one of the Big Four banks requires partners to have this certification in order to conduct ethical attacks, highlighting how partners must always aim to stay on the front foot in the rapidly evolving world of finance.

Given the sector’s reputation for exceptionally swift evolution cycles, it’s a trait that is no longer desirable for partners, rather necessary in 2016 and beyond.

Bailey consulting for, and selling products and services to, some of Australia’s largest financial services institutions, including the Reserve bank of Australia, Westpac, Allianz and CBA.

Next big thingSpecific to security infrastructure, the financial services sector has one of the highest rates of investment than any other sector, with banks generally sitting at the top of the sector in terms of security investment as a percentage of total IT spend.

The stakes are high, and the sector’s investment in security technology reflects that.

For Bailey, this means that banks usually have extensive and sophisticated internal security teams that are always on the lookout for the next big thing in security, and they generally err on the side of early adoption. But this can sometimes lead to tricky conversations.

Bailey had recently been in a meeting with a bank, when he was asked whether The Missing Link could provide it with any “quantum cryptography architects”.

“I read New Scientist, and I thought that was still in the laboratory,” Bailey recalled. “But it turns out that there’s a vendor that does point-to-point quantum-encrypted laser-based communications.”

Bailey believes this highlights yet another quirk of selling technology into the financial services sector: not only is it okay to say ‘no’ to the big banks, it’s also entirely acceptable to profess ignorance.

“I don’t feel ashamed at all to tell them, ‘no, we don’t have any quantum cryptography architects’,” he added.

Instead, Bailey makes a case for the talents and abilities of his

team, offering up smart people who are good architects, good at cryptography, and who are also keen to learn.

With this in mind, a bank might pay The Missing Link staff members to learn with them about how to develop and use emerging security technology.

But once again, this approach all comes down one overriding quality.

“You’ve got to be honest,” he added. “Banks are built on trust and selling security is about trust.”

Always on the front footOnce trust is built however, then the real work begins.

“Banks are quite often early adopters of things,” Bailey added. “CBA is known as being the first bank [in Australia] to put some of its service in Amazon – in public cloud.

“Somebody’s got to do it. And banks – along with federal government – have got the biggest budgets to do it for security, so why shouldn’t they?”

Consequently, working in security technology requires a blend of constant research and getting the most out of the technology available today.

“Banks are built on trust and selling security is about trust”

HYPERCONVERGEDPowered by Avnet

VXRAIL 60 Appliance. Simple, Powerful and Scalable.

$2461*

PER MONTH OVER 3 YEARS

When hosted and managed through Powered by Avnet

Shown appliance based on 4 node VXRAIL60 appliance. Contact your Avnet sales team for more info.

*Based on hardware and services purchased with appliance. PBA pricing may vary based on features and services required. The Powered by Avnet Solution includes extra Avnet Services that are not included in the upfront infrastructure cost.


Driven by increased cloud adoption and tailored technological

solutions, healthcare is becoming one of the fastest growing verticals in Australia.

Reflective of global trends, healthcare IT spending in Australia continues to increase, triggered by a growing and ageing population, advances in medical technology and treatments, and an increasing awareness of health-related issues.

For BEarena managing director, Darren Ashley, partnership with hyper-converged vendor Nutanix has allowed the Sydney-based reseller to expand into the lucrative healthcare market in Australia.

“We brought Nutanix to Australia in 2012 and realised that it’s suitable for all verticals,” he said. “Nutanix has architecture that allows businesses to scale infinitely but also tolerate loss of instances, or single nodes.”

As leaders in next-generation virtualisation, BEarena provides a range of managed services across on premise and cloud, striking partnerships with key vendors such as Nutanix, Microsoft, VMware, Veeam, Dell, Cisco and Pure Storage.

Today, healthcare represents a core part of the channel arsenal for resellers – BEarena managing director, Darren Ashley, explains its potential to Hafizah Osman.

30 HEALTH/BEARENA



BEARENA/HEALTH 31

“Analytics continues to be one of the fastest-growing segments of the provider IT budget in 2016 as it has been for several years,” Hanover added.

“Ongoing investment in ACO, clinical, and quality will continue in 2016, but hot areas of new analytics investment reported also include provider and care team performance analytics, as well as analytics that examine referral patterns and other financial analytics areas.”

As digital disruption impacts all verticals, healthcare

included, Ashley said the transforming technology landscape is triggering changing conversations with end-users.

In Australia, providers are taking advantage of more cloud implementations and leveraging mobile and analytics capabilities in the cloud.

Specific to health, comfort levels with cloud are growing, with hospitals and healthcare organisations increasingly seeing the viability of moving workloads to the skies.

“Our conversations of four years focused around what a

With core competencies in retail, government, automation and higher education, the company advanced its efforts within healthcare through strong end-user relationships, with one customer purchasing ten rounds of infrastructure.

“When you are getting repeat business over a three-year relationship, there’s got to be something in that,” Ashley said. “Nutanix in particular is attractive to healthcare providers because they don’t have to buy those huge monolithic storage

devices, which comes with a pay-as-you-grow model.

“We’re now targeting other healthcare customers, leveraging the success we’ve had with our first healthcare win.”

Consequently, Ashley said 30 per cent of the company’s business now comes from health, with the company owning an exclusive Nutanix relationship with one of Australia’s largest healthcare providers.

“We’re focused on a particular kind of technology,” Ashley said. “We don’t have a huge vendor portfolio and in terms of the

A clean bill of channel health

platform, 99 times out of 100, it will be a Nutanix platform but they’ve got OEM relationships with both Dell and Lenovo, so it could be any flavour.”

TechnologiesAccording to IDC findings, top drivers for technology budget growth in healthcare include analytics, patient engagement, customer relationship management and security.

“Security strategies are maturing,” IDC research director, Judy Hanover, said.

“Cybersecurity is one of the new growth areas in the provider IT budget, and this growth is expected to continue in 2016.

“Threats are top of mind, but the increased availability of resources for IT security is allowing providers to begin to implement strategies to secure data and networks. Top priorities include focusing on security in the cloud, monitoring the environment, and controlling shadow IT.”

Meanwhile, analytics spending continues to grow, and big data is also here to stay in healthcare.

“Everything’s going digital and that leads to increased storage requirement, and availability of that data”

Darren Ashley – BEarena


32 HEALTH/BEARENA

the Nutanix infrastructure,” he said.

“VDI has made it easy to get information to doctors. In some of the hospitals, we’re no longer looking at clipboards at the bottom of patients’ beds. We’re now using an iPad and PCs. VDI has enabled better patient care.”

Delving deeper, Ashley said healthcare end-users also seek greater levels of availability from technology deployments.

“Our conversations are all around availability,” he said.

“Businesses with traditional architectures very rarely revisit the architecture and apply software upgrade to a storage device, unless it’s addressing a particular bug or delivering a superior functionality.

“From a business outcomes point of view, they want availability 24/7 and don’t want to spend a fortune managing it. They want to take cost out of the IT infrastructure alongside a greater speed to market.”

Looking ahead, Ashley said BEarena has a goal to deploy this technology across every healthcare provider in Australia.

“Everything’s going digital and that leads to increased storage requirement, and availability of that data,” he said.

“That’s the perfect storm for this type of architecture. A lot of the healthcare customers we have don’t have large IT teams and with everyone trying to do more with less, that simplification and infrastructure resonates well.”

As the perfect storm descends over the market in Australia, for BEarena, success in the sector continues to offer a healthy return on investment.

vendor system looks like and the components within it,” Ashley recalled. “But today we talk about business outcomes and not hardware with our customers.

“Hardware is just a commodity, what we’re talking about is the simplicity.”

Ashley said trends such as cloud, mobility, storage and virtualisation have contributed to altering the “type and quality” of conversations with end-users across healthcare, as customer demands continue to change.

“Digital disruption has increased our customers’ storage requirements and it has made them serve their customers faster and lets them make things available immediately,” he said.

“It hasn’t dramatically changed conversations but the scale out story works well.”

Yet in the healthcare, Ashley said many providers still remain reluctant to send data to the public cloud, allowing BEarena to leverage its relationship with Nutanix.

“There might be a number of auxiliary services that they want to run in the public cloud,” he explained. “The Nutanix architecture, because it’s software based, allows customers to embrace the public cloud as it works with AWS and Microsoft.

“It’s attractive because the pay-as-you-go type model means that they don’t need to go out and spend millions of dollars on storage, they can start off with a smaller investment and as the number of images grows, they can just add nodes. It’s very simple to do that.”

Within health, Ashley said the long-term goal is to make workloads portable between on-premise private cloud infrastructure and Microsoft’s public cloud infrastructure.

“There’s an interest there but again, there’s not a lot of data that gets up on the public clouds,” he added.

Customer demandsAshley said the deployment of Nutanix architecture within a health environment provides a strong customer advantage in that it blends with Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), allowing providers to centralise desktop services.

“Our largest customers in the healthcare space both run VDI and several other loads on

“Hardware is just a commodity, what we’re talking about is the simplicity”

CHOOSE YOUR VR READY SYSTEM Systems featuring the latest 6th Gen Intel® Core™ processors offer cutting-edge Intel technologies and the performance necessary to conquer power-hungry VR worlds.

Copyright © 2012020222022 6 Intel CCCCCooooooorporrraraaaaaaattitiotiottiotiotiotiotitiotiotitiotiotioioiooonnnn.n..nnnnnnnn.n All rights reserved. Intel, the Inteeteeteeeeteel ll ll llll ll ll lll llllogoogogoogoggogoggogogogoogogoogoogogoogogoggogooogogogogogogoooogogogogogogogogogogogoogooogoogogooooogg , I, I, , , I, ,,, ,,,,,,, ntel® ExxxpxpppExpEx eerierieeerieee eneeeennnccen e WWhathathathat’s’’ss s InsInsInssInsididddddedeideideiidei ™, ™,, ™, ,™,,™,™,™, ™, ™, ™™, ,, annnndnnndnddnnannnndn thee Ie Ie ntentennnnnnnnnntententetetententententeeententennntenttenntennntntentennnnntenntennn ll®®®l®l®®l®ll®l®l®ll®lll®ll®l®ll®l®®l®®®ll®®®llllll ExExpxpppppxpExxExpEEE erererierieriereririerierierererierereriririeririeerierieerieeriereeriirrr eeencencencencencencenceneeenencencenencncnenencencencennccncenncce We We We WWe We Wee Weee eeeee hahaaaaatatathhaaaataaata ’’s’s’s InInside™ logo are trademarks os os os os os oos f Intel Corporaoraoraorarrr tiotiotioioioioooooooooooonn in in in in in in in iin iinn n iiiin i iiinn tn tn tn tn tn tn tn tn tn tn tn tnn tnn tn tn tn hhhe hhhhh U.S. and/or other countries. *OthOtOOthO eeerer err rrererre nnnannnnannanamnaaanamnamnnnamamnnaamnanaananannnananananannnananaananaanamnannaamnnnnaamnamnnaa esess aaandanddanannnanaaaaaaa d brbbb aaandaannndanndaaa dss may be claclaimmeeei d dd ad adddddd d ss s s ttsss sssss s tsss hehe he proproprororrooooooooooorooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooperpeppeperperperpeperperperperpererpperperppererty ty tytytytytty tytty ttytttytyttttytttyttttttyttytytytytyytytty tytyyyyyy oof offfof oo othotottththththhhothhhothhothththhhhhhhhhhhhhhthhhht eeeersrseeeeerserseeeeeeeeee ..0416/CMD//CAFCACACACACACA /PDF

Less than 48 hours after entering into an agreement to acquire the

Technology Solutions business from Avnet, Tech Data CEO, Bob Dutkowsky, played his hand.

“Let me paint you a picture,” he explained. “You’re a reseller with a mid-sized customer who wants a complete technology refresh, covering infrastructure, mobile and network upgrades.

“So what do you do? You call your data centre distributor, then you call your networking distributor and then you call your software distributor.

“Then, you call the distributor who specialises in desktop refreshes and the distributor with expertise in securing the entire environment.

“Or, you call Tech Data.”Perhaps it’s the brash

American approach, but nonetheless, in the eyes of Dutkowsky, Tech Data is bound together with much stronger DNA that its fiercest competitors in the channel.

As the world’s second largest distributor – behind only Ingram Micro in size and scale – the US-based organisation is a true titan of industry, generating $US26.4 billion in net sales for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2016, with a no.108 ranking on the Fortune 500.

Selling over 150,000 products to over 105,000 customers spanning over 100 countries, Tech Data processes more than 50,000 daily transactions, through representing market leading vendors such as Apple, Cisco, Microsoft, IBM, HP,

After years of speculation, Tech Data finally signalled its intention to touch down on Australia shores – Tech Data CEO, Bob Dutkowsky, outlines to James Henderson what makes the distribution giant tick.

TECH DATAIN TOWN…

Bob Dutkowsky (Tech Data)

34 INTERVIEW/TECH DATA



TECH DATA /INTERVIEW 35

social business, big data and analytics.

As outlined by IDC, 3rd Platform solutions are expected to be the primary growth driver of the ICT industry over the next decade, responsible for 75 per cent of the growth as worldwide industry spend moves from $US3.2 trillion in 2013 to $US5.3 trillion by 2020.

“Stack us up against any of the other players and you’ll find that we’re the only ones capable of addressing the broader array of issues in the market today,” Dutkowsky claimed.

With cloud at its core, the 3rd Platform represents the next-generation compute platform characterised by a proliferation of always-connected smart mobile devices, coupled with the widespread usage of social networking, and layered over a cloud-based server infrastructure supporting important new workloads such as big data analytics.

Yet for resellers in Australia, such rhetoric remains just that, rhetoric.

For partners are forever fielding pitches that profess true expertise across the entire technology spectrum, the one-stop-shop in distribution and the magic supermarket of choice for the channel.

But is the notion of end-to-end now representative

of more than just an empty phrase?

“Our view is that the IT distributor of the future has to be that end-to-end player and the reason for this is simple,” Dutkowsky explained.

“Computing is growing every day and there is more compute than the day before. Think of the computing capability in your

smartphone compared to what it was before, and then Apple announces a new device with greater power, more speed, more compute and longer battery life.

“But if you’re siloed and only support a place where that computing happens, we think you’re limiting yourself as a distributor.”

Dutkowsky said the distributor operates across the entire spectrum of where computing happens, from the home to the cloud.

“We touch the home, the consumer, the devices, the small and medium-sized businesses, up into enterprise, into small and large data centres and on the onramp to the cloud,” he said. “We do all of that today and that’s what we think separates us from the competition.”

In short, Dutkowsky believes the “narrowly focused” distributor of the past will be left behind, as the data centre expands and the 3rd Platform takes control of the technology market.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Dell et al.

Despite streams of investor presentation statistics however, Tech Data aims to become the quintessential modern-day distributor, fusing distributor volume with reseller value as it bids to turn the Australian channel on its head.

“We’ll worry about sourcing the product, the reseller can worry about adding value,” Dutkowsky said. “The role of the reseller is to project manage and implement, that’s the real value, not in the management of the kit.

“That’s our job and we can do that end-to-end which represents a huge advantage for the channel, especially at the smaller end of town. Smaller resellers don’t have the time or resources to manage multiple distributors, sort pricing and manage shipments and logistics.

“They want to solve customer problems because that’s what the customer will pay them for and crucially, that’s where the margin is.”

Spanning the spectrumTerms of the multi-billion dollar acquisition – which is expected to close in early 2017 – sees Tech Data take control of Avnet’s core distribution portfolio, establishing an immediate Asia Pacific presence and increased capabilities around data centre services, software and hardware.

In chasing Avnet for over two years, Dutkowsky said the deal allows Tech Data to take ownership of the 3rd Platform play, spanning cloud, mobility,

“We’ll worry about sourcing the product, the reseller can worry about adding value”


36 INTERVIEW/TECH DATA

“Vendors are not supply chain or sales companies, they live, breathe and die to invent,” he said. “They invent and because of this, they’ve pushed more work towards distribution.

“We work with vendors that have outsourced their entire supply chain and have given us whole customer sets that they don’t even contact anymore, it’s all through distribution.

“We manage products, investor levels, the number of resellers in a market and we do all of that for a fee, which is dramatically different to the distributor of 10 years ago. We used to pick, pack and ship boxes, but things have changed.”

Dutkowsky said Tech Data will soon “jump into a leadership role” across the global market upon completion of the deal, emphasising the distributor’s deepened set of skills and technologies.

“Once we get there we will set the agenda,” he said. “We don’t own any IP but once it’s been invented we will be best placed to show the channel how to utilise new technologies through training, certifications, configuration capabilities up to building out converged infrastructure and hardware, as well as loading software.

“We have much of those capabilities today but we believe that you have to continually improve to be a competitive force within the channel.”

Future of distributionConsequently, in the eyes of Tech Data, the reseller today wants to do less with products and more with solutions and services.

“But there still has to be products there to make that solution become a reality,” Dutkowsky cautioned.

“The value proposition of the distributor has also changed as the reseller channel moves into the services and support markets, but it doesn’t mean the value of the kit is less important. Rather it just means the work has moved to a different place.”

Following channel-related roles at IBM and EMC, Dutkowsky accepts that vendors live to “invent things, not to supply or sell things”, creating a pivotal role for distribution as a result.

“Once we get there we will set the agenda”

WHY AVNET?

“There’s still six to nine months left before this deal closes,

and until then, we’re competitors with Avnet.”

But from a technology perspective, Dutkowsky said Tech

Data “consciously moved into the data centre space” to

reflect the changing trends of the market, and the rise of

3rd Platform technologies.

“Avnet ticked all of our boxes in terms of growing our

Americas business, expanding our data centre focus and

entering Asia Pacific,” he said.

“But it took us over a year to convince Avnet to make the

deal happen, we took an unsolicited bid to them because the

business wasn’t for sale and they weren’t interested in selling.”

In short, Dutkowsky said the board believed Tech Data

needed to become more skilled and carry more depth within its

data centre business.

“We needed to diversify out and put the company in balance

again, through growing the Americas business and keeping our

momentum in Europe,” he said.

Lastly, Dutkowsky said Tech Data believed the time was

right to move in the Asia Pacific market following the rollout

of the company’s internal SAP system, which took ten years

longer than previously planned.

“It took us longer to get ready for Asia,” he explained. “We

were deploying SAP around the globe for 12 years and it was

supposed to be an easy product that would take a couple of

years, but it was massive and took 12 years.

“But now 95 per cent of Tech Data is run through one SAP

template and system which means we operate the same in

Venice as we do in Las Vegas.”

“The IT distributor of the future has to be that end-to-end player”

Tech Data headquarters


38 ANALYSIS/GARTNER

Customers are rapidly turning into competitors. Is your business prepared?

W e’ve seen the rapid

rise of online sharing

platforms in recent years

like Airbnb, which now has more

than two million properties listed

for rent, without owning a single

piece of real estate.

While there’s an assumption that

the sharing economy is only a B2C

phenomenon, it’s having impact on

the B2B segment as well.

Sharing assets and resources

can help organisations access

otherwise prohibitive assets and

services due to lack of resources,

allowing them to react quickly to

market changes in a less expensive

and more efficient manner.

The sharing economy is shaking

up the traditional approach of

end users purchasing equipment

outright from an original equipment

manufacturer (OEM), or via a utility,

consumption model from cloud

providers, managed cloud providers

or channel partners.

An organisation that needs IT

resources to support its significant

expansion, for example, might be

considering whether to purchase

new servers and storage equipment,

or expand its existing data centre.

What if that same company were

to find an existing organisation with

excess technology capacity, which is

willing to “share” its IT infrastructure

with other companies?

The sharing economy is shifting

IT purchasing decisions away from

incumbent IT and extends the meaning

of customers and competitors, where

every company is an IT company.

“While there’s an assumption that the sharing economy is only a B2C phenomenon, it’s

having impact on the B2B segment as well”

Understanding the impact of the sharing economy

IT buyers can end up competing

with their OEMs and service

providers, complicating the work of

strategic planners as they seek new

avenues for growth.

The blurring between providers and customersThe line between providers and

customers becomes blurred as IT

organisations with excess capacity and

new digital capabilities seek to create

new revenue streams, potentially

altering the vendor landscape with

more competitive offers.

If you think this is farfetched,

you only have to look at the

disruption that’s beginning to

happen in construction, farming

and manufacturing — anywhere

there are big, upfront investments in

expensive equipment assets.

Monetisation of excess IT capacity

via sharing models is not some

distant future phenomenon.

IT providers are already

developing business models around

the sharing economy, leveraging

consumer PCs (idle CPUs, unused

storage), network bandwidth and

excess cloud computing resources.

There’s an irreversible and

growing trend away from outright

IT ownership in favour of “access”

when needed, especially in

infrastructure and software.

This leaves providers scrambling

to ease the blow to their traditional

business as they compete with cloud

business models on one hand, and

seek new customers and market

segments to maintain profitability

and stay relevant on the other.

Maximising assetsExisting go-to-market strategies

will not necessarily work in the

sharing economy model, requiring

service providers to develop new

competitive and partnership models.

It’s fundamentally about maximising

the utilisation of existing assets,

allowing organisations and users to

share capacity.

To do so, a platform that connects

sellers and buyers is required,

similar to what the Airbnb and Uber

applications do for home and vehicle

owners willing to rent their assets

to users.

For IT assets, this can be

accomplished through system

integrators (SIs), cloud service brokers

(CSBs) and other intermediaries

utilising powerful software platforms

that connect assets, services and

market participants.

Service providers need to identify

products, services and software

platforms that can be provided to

the various parts of the ecosystem,

from existing customers to partners,

which allow them to remain a

relevant participant in the sharing

economy value chain.

By Moe Ali — group vice president of Australia and New Zealand, Gartner

Moe Ali - Gartner


Back-up and business continuity are fundamental in any business strategy - Hafizah Osman

examines how this translates in the channel.

BUILDING A BUSINESS CONTINUITY

CHANNEL PLAN

While Australia remains aware of the need to deploy comprehensive

disaster recovery plans – to prevent downtime and facilitate faster recovery time – businesses remain challenged when compiling a strategy of mission-critical importance.

Crucial to operating in 24/7/365 environments, disasters today are no longer simply of the natural variety, as the impact of man-made errors continue to hinder enterprise.

Often human error turns an avoidable problem into a catastrophe, placing the data centre under new pressures and strains.

“Organisations are relying on their data centres more than ever before,” APC by Schneider Electric partner development manager, Beau Alderson, said.

“This places tremendous pressure on IT professionals to keep their data centre and network infrastructure running at all times.”

With zero-disruption as the ultimate goal, Alderson believes Australian management must carefully evaluate and mitigate risks to the physical infrastructure that supports a mission-critical facility.

“Without a proper disaster mitigation plan for a facility’s infrastructure, the overall business continuity plan is built on a risky foundation,” he added.

In short, Alderson said to survive tomorrow’s disaster, planning must be made today.

40 TECH WATCH/BUSINESS CONTINUITY


BUSINESS CONTINUITY/TECH WATCH 41

“The main costs of business continuity lies in having the expert skill sets either internally with the business or with a service provider to ensure the plans produced are closely aligned with business expectations and customer experience.”

As a result, Atherton believes downtime carries an “enormous price tag”, emphasising the critical nature of minimising interruption to business operations.

“The price tag varies not only by industry, but also by the scale of business operations,” he added.

“For a medium-sized business, the hourly cost may be lower, yet the business impact can be proportionally larger.

“Nailing down the cost of each hour of downtime varies and is based on a number of factors, such as the nature of the business, the size of the company and the criticality of its IT systems related to revenue generation.”

“Every second a data centre is offline costs an enterprise revenue, current and potential customers, and lost productivity,” he observed.

“Data centre outages can prevent online transactions, employee collaboration, data access, customer service, data back-up and recovery, and many more essential functions of a modern digital business.”

Digital transformationAs digital transformation takes shape across the country, business leaders are starting to grasp the huge potential of digital business, and demanding a better return on their organisation’s information assets and use of analytics.

Through the rise of data, and the phenomenal rate it is expected to continue increasing, organisations are struggling with traditional back-up methods that can no longer meet operational service-level agreements (SLAs).

“Businesses are now looking at rapid data protection and recovery methods such as snapshots and replication to augment or replace back-up to disk, tape or cloud strategies,” Nimble Storage Asia-Pacific and Japan systems engineering director, John Whyte, added.

“The increased reliance on IT systems has driven an expectation that data or systems are always available. Old methods of sending tapes offsite each day, and recalling them to perform a restore meant that end-users were waiting hours or days for their data.”

For Whyte, such methods no longer represent an acceptable SLA

for many organisations, meaning that keeping a local copy on disk is the new normal to meet operational recovery objectives.

“Customers also have new options for business continuity and can replicate to cloud or hosted service providers rather than building their own secondary site,” he added.

As explained by Whyte, piecing together a modern-day disaster recovery plan requires a two-step process.

The first involves identifying critical applications and data, which includes interviewing different parts of the business and mapping out the dependencies on revenue generation and receivables.

“Systems such as email, that were not deemed critical 10 to 15 years ago, are now often considered mission critical, so a regular review process is also important to make sure you keep up to date,” he explained.

“Next is to map those applications to the underlying IT systems, and ultimately find a balance of recovery time and cost that suits the business.”

Business requirementsYet back-up and business continuity plans must align with business strategy and operations, irrespective of the corporate agenda.

Whether through organisations increasing cloud adoption, honing in on hybrid models or deploying a digitally-focused end-user strategy, parallels must be made with the overall business requirements.

According to Eaton Australia and New Zealand power quality general manager, John Atherton, an effective preventive maintenance strategy can be one of the most cost-effective measures.

“Because regular maintenance practices improve systems reliability and performance, while notably deterring downtime, preventive maintenance is an essential component of an end-to-end solution,” he explained. Pieter DeGunst (Tecala Group)

Sam Voukenas (Oracle)




businesses face, while removing the operational burden for an IT team to facilitate back-up and disaster recovery platforms.

“The as-a-service business model is the perfect solution for back-up and business continuity, being on demand when you need it,” he added.

Rise of the MSPGoing forward, the future of business continuity in Australia depends on the education of the channel, as outlined by StorageCraft Asia-Pacific senior disaster recovery planning architect, Jack Alsop.

Alsop believes that during the next five years, the market will experience a growth in the number of managed service providers operating across Australia, providing education takes an upward curve.

“Business continuity is going to be a huge part of the MSP business in the next five years,” he predicted.

“Any partners that want to exist need to be an MSP of some sort. But we need education now for those partners to be able to gear themselves to think this way.”

Alsop said many organisations now believe that business continuity is no longer a problem, as a result of a lack of education.

“It’s tough to be in this business at the moment,” he admitted. “Two years ago, business continuity was not a difficult conversation to have because the Brisbane floods were still fresh in people’s minds and power outages were more common.

“But people have forgotten those lessons and are looking at reducing costs – it’s a part of the profitability conversation – and businesses are looking to drop business continuity cases because they don’t see value in this.

“Partners can benefit from being agile in terms of pricing, delivery, and implementation and have a range of business continuity options for their customers – it can be from the simple to the very complex.”

Channel playFrom a channel perspective, Oracle A/NZ storage director of business development, Sam Voukenas, said partners can now provide customer consulting practices, through to hosting and services around regular testing.

“If channel partners can look at opportunities to provide consulting around the likes of data classification, the prioritisation or risk profile of each application, and suggest the best method of back-up and business continuity,” he said.

In addition, Voukenas said the channel can help businesses take advantage of the database back-up cloud service space, where customers can utilise the same tools on-premise and back-up databases on to the cloud.

“Cloud-like offerings or hosted offerings through partners are ways to get around the high costs of business continuity,” he said.

“The partner can sell back-up for cloud or look at potentially hosting recovery appliances, for instance, to back-up customers’ environment and protect their recovery time.”

Furthermore, Voukenas outlined new opportunities around focusing on purpose built solutions at the heart of the recovery process.

“Because most businesses have their most critical workloads running on top of a database, instead of trying to back-up that information quickly, the focus should be on recovering as quickly as possible and eliminate any data lost,” he added.

From the partner side of the fence however, Tecala Group managing director, Pieter DeGunst, said the channel first needs to map out the true core systems within any company, outlining core interactions and dependencies.

“From this, the disaster recovery plan exercise can begin – modelling RPO and RTO requirements, selecting tools, vendors and most importantly,

defining or integrating with existing critical incident policies,” he said.

“Selecting a tool and partner to assist can help with the ongoing testing and upkeep requirements. And this is where a partner can come in.”

Looking ahead, DeGunst sees new potential in resellers engaging with customers in a reduction of business risk conversation.

“Business continuity is a major element of reducing risk, with the ultimate goal of protecting their revenues,” he advised.

“This helps to move away from a technical conversation and towards a business outcomes conversation in terms of which services and applications a business needs available to them, and in what timeframe should a disaster occur.”

For DeGunst, there are substantial opportunities for simplified offerings to address the risks that all

Jack Alsop (Storagecraft)

“Any partners that want to exist

need to be an MSP of some sort. But

we need education now for those

partners to be able to gear themselves to think this way”

Wells FargoCommercial Distribution Finance

A channel solution for growth and efficiency

cdf.wf.com/australia* Subject to satisfactory credit and other approvals. Terms and conditions apply.

© 2016 Wells Fargo International Finance, LLC & Wells Fargo International Finance (Australia) Pty Ltd. All rights reserved.

Wells Fargo Commercial Distribution Finance is the trade name for certain inventory (floor planning) services of Wells Fargo & Company and its subsidiaries including Wells Fargo International Finance, LLC and Wells Fargo International Finance (Australia) Pty Ltd (collectively, CDF).Wells Fargo International Finance, LLC and Wells Fargo International Finance (Australia) Pty Ltd are subsidiaries of Wells Fargo & Company, companies that are not authorised by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) as Authorised Deposit-taking Institutions (ADIs) in Australia or licensed or regulated by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) as Australian Financial Services Licence holders.

At Wells Fargo Commercial Distribution Finance we understand that cashflow management can be complex. We’ve developed a channel finance solution to help you remain agile and flexible.* Channel Finance keeps products moving through the supply chain by giving you the flexibility to replace your open account terms with varying repayment term options.* You’ll benefit from more predictable cashflow so you can confidently invest in business growth and efficiency. With Channel Finance, we’ll help you free up time to focus on what really matters — your customers.

Whether you are a manufacturer, distributor, reseller or partner; to learn how Channel Finance can help grow your business, call Damien Macaulay on 0416 477 341.



From the perspective of the partner, the back-up and business continuity

conversation has now changed between organisations and IT vendors in recent years.

Previously, it was the vendor often found trying to persuade decision makers to invest more in expensive back-up solutions, yet today, it’s the business demanding new technologies around Recovery Point Objectives (RPO) and Recovery Time Objectives (RTO).

“An RTO is the amount of time that it should take to bring the IT systems back online following a disaster,” ASI Solutions managing director, Nathan Lowe, explained.

“Decision makers are becoming more aware of the risk to their businesses should an event render their IT systems unavailable, both financially and reputational.”

Lowe said there is a greater awareness within most companies not only of the business risk but also the technologies that are available

to mitigate those risks.“Software vendors of

products that protect against this risk are putting greater efforts into educating business owners and decision makers of what is possible,” he said.

“Back-up and recovery software is trending right now, and for good reason. Everyone is well aware of ransomware and knows at least one person that has been affected by it.

“It is forefront of most people’s minds to ensure that they are not caught in a situation where they are forced to pay a ransom to recover the business’ data from Cryptolocker or similar.”

Consequently, Lowe believes partners can add deeper value through offering “much more than quoting” for a bill of materials to implement a back-up

system and software.“The IT vendor really should

be building out a full managed service for all customer’s back-up and recovery systems, including professional services to build out a DR plan, and testing it on a yearly basis,” he added.

For Lowe, there are two questions to ask when considering a disaster recovery plan.

Firstly, what is the maximum tolerable period in which data might be lost from an IT service due to a major incident (RPO)?

Secondly, what is the duration of time and the service level within which a business process must be restored after a disaster (or disruption) in order to avoid unacceptable consequences associated with a break in business continuity RTO?

“The IT vendor really becomes the trusted advisor in this capacity and has a great opportunity to win the trust and confidence of their customer when they can demonstrate the ability to bring a business back online quickly after a disaster occurs,” he added.

When the answers to those questions have been determined, Lowe said then a disaster recovery plan can be drawn up by an IT services provider.

“It is key to ensure that your IT vendor can demonstrate they have the processes in place

themselves to competently do this for you,” he added.

“Demonstrable evidence that they have done this in the past is always useful. The objectives should be agreed upon and legally agreed to by your IT services provider, along with the costs to perform the tests.

“Finally, you should ensure that the DR process is actually tested, every 12 months is optimal, and that the results of the testing are documented and improvements made where required.”

PARTNER PERSPECTIVE – ASI SOLUTIONS…

Nathan Lowe

(ASI Solutions)

“Everyone is well aware of ransomware and knows at least one person that has been affected by it”

Prevention isn’t a myth. Find out how we’re using artificial intelligence and machine learning to stop threats from ever executing on your endpoints. Learn more at cylance.com.

SILENCECYBERATTACKS


46 ROUNDTABLE/MOBILITY

ARN recently assessed the channel’s most lucrative mobility-orientated opportunities, uncovering the art of creating viable mobile strategies and maximising ongoing enterprise trends – Hafizah Osman reports.

Mobility meets the channel, but how can partners maximise the opportunity?

Mobility continues to gain greater interpretation across enterprise, as data becomes the lifeblood of today’s

business and new devices flood the market.But in this digital age, mobility – and all it

encompasses – continues to be a complex beast, and as it climbs up the enterprise priority ladder, how can the channel compete?

Organisations across Australia are becoming more power driven by data every day to make decisions, increase revenue, mitigate risk and innovate – seeking trusted partners to build tailored mobility strategies for 2016 and beyond.

With further market growth projected – coupled with new productivity tools – businesses now recognise the benefits that can be gleaned through a mobility mind shift.

The consumerisation of IT with mobile devices and their ecosystem of applications (called mass-market mobility) has gone into overdrive. Research by Gartner has shown that businesses need to focus on how these devices drive innovation and create business value, carefully balancing device and data control with employee freedom.

“It’s challenging us as an industry to take a position of leadership to demystify some of the tech speak and more so show people that the

journey, the end that can come through deploying proper mobile strategies,” Staples Technology Solutions general manager, Karl Sice, said.

Sice further elaborated on it, saying when it comes to mobility, vendors need to stop selling products and sell concepts, business improvements, cost savings and process improvements instead.

“That’s the language of the economy we’re now in,” he said. “We’re not in an economy which is looking for the smartest dude who has got the biggest IT degree. People need to have, at every level, business conversations and those conversations need to be value adding at every level.”

Channel Dynamics co-founder, Cam Wayland, said conversations around mobility have evolved from devices to one that is more about workflow and coming to terms with what customers are now facing and want.

“It’s a combination of how people want to work and using our collective intelligence and technologies to create a solution as an integrator or a supplier that works and delivers an outcome for customers,” he said. “That’s the essence of the mobility discussion.”

Airloom chief technology officer, Adrian Jeremy Pollak (Peace of Mind Technology)

Jay Turner (Targus)


MOBILITY/ROUNDTABLE 47

Nick Beaugeard HUBONE

Cam Wayland

CHANNEL DYNAMICS

Basil Reilly

LOGICALIS

Hafizah Osman

ARN

Karl Sice

STAPLES

James Henderson

ARN

James Reilly

SKYWIRE

Peter Stein

DATACOM

Wayne Harper

ZEBRA

Martyn Young

F5

Adrian Noblett

AIRLOOM

Chris Hagios

AIRLOOM

Jay Turner

TARGUS

Noblett, said traditional business owners and technologists forget about the outcome they’re trying to drive – user experience.

“Technology has capabilities to make it really easy for users to consume data and produce data, but IT shops have had blinkers on and configured their environment in such a way that it’s easy for them to run and not easy for users to run.”

Datacom software licensing general manager, Peter Stein, said mobility in the corporate space needs to go beyond the mobile phone.

“You can’t do everything on a mobile phone,” he said. “It doesn’t cut the mustard; it doesn’t solve all problems. As you go into the public sector, mobility is around keeping the security piece going between the environment you’re living in within the office to wherever you’re working from your mobile environment and make sure there’s a secure gateway housing that information on the device.”

In the rugged mobility space, Targus A/NZ general manager, Jay Turner, said there has been a big shift from an operating system perspective, driven by the consumerism, and by Microsoft being one of the biggest players in that industry.

“What we’re seeing now is a shift from traditional key-based devices to consumer devices, but still rugged,” he said. “What that means is a lot of retailers are looking to engage their store associates and their customers.

“It’s also about giving them productivity gains. It’s very fast paced, but there’s a lot of good work going on in that area.”

Building a mobile culture in the workplace Logicalis Australia CEO, Basil O’Reilly, said change begins within a business itself, outlining that a mobile culture should be developed within each and every organisation and management should lead based on trust.

“The expectations of a younger workforce are different to what leaders want,” he said. “Leaders want to see staff physically in the office. That shouldn’t be the case. It should be objective, matrix, and output driven regardless of where they work from.

“It’s one thing with technology; it’s another to have the culture. Businesses should have the processes and performance management in place to allow it to happen.”

Peace of Mind Technology strategy and development director, Jeremy Pollak, agreed with O’Reilly, believing that it’s about culture and mandate and how well that is transferred. Pollak suggested businesses follow through with the learning and development of a mobility strategy.

“Whether it’s the physical space or the technology or not knowing how to use hardware or software platforms, it needs to be transferred,” he



said. “If not, all the investment is wasted. And that permeates through, especially if you’ve got a bad culture.”

Stein added that the reality is, people within the organisation are the advocates and are the ones that are going to make it work.

“People are creatures of habit,” he added. “From a cultural perspective, if you’re wanting to drive it, you need to make sure that those people either remain in the business, are invested in the business or pass on their learnings.

“We had the greatest successes where we’re actually embedded from a managed services perspective because we can then continue to drive that adoption, make sure we have the training programs in place and partner in some cases with third-party,” he added.

Portability vs mobility But some businesses confuse mobility with portability. Zebra Technologies Asia-Pacific chief technology officer, Wayne Harper, said some of the biggest mobility problems arise

because what CEOs think is a mobility strategy is actually a portability strategy.

Harper went on to explain the difference between a portability strategy, as compared to a mobility strategy.

“Portability is about doing my normal work wherever I am,” he said. “Mobility is about specific information and specific interaction where and when I need it. Portability is walking with my laptop and running my desktop where I am; mobility is about that specific business function.”

Sice elaborated further and said portability is about the physical device and the tools within the environment.

“We’re working with corporates that have decided on these devices and they’re all going to be agile and flexible workplaces,” he

said. “First of all, it’s about what type of device they have. Then we look at all the physical settings in that new flexible environment.”

Security fears It’s no doubt that mobility represents an opportunity for innovation and business process improvement. If managed incorrectly, enterprise use of mobile devices increases data risks and costs.

Research by Gartner has shown that more mobility-based devices and form factors will emerge to complicate things, creating new ways to communicate and collaborate, in addition to new ways to lose data, trade secrets and private information.

Gartner said enthusiasm for mobile deployments has far outpaced mobile security and C-level executives need to ask three critical questions – how is mass-market mobility creating enterprise value? What is the best balance of freedom and control? What package of policies and technologies delivers the mass-market mobility sweet spot?

Wayland echoed the same sentiments. He said mass-market mobile devices flooding most enterprises are not designed with security and manageability in mind.

“That comes down to the security fear that goes with mobility because when CEOs think about all these devices in their organisations and people using data, they can’t control them or lock them down,” he said. “They think that if they can see it, they can control it and therefore, they’re compliant.”

F5 Networks A/NZ systems engineering manager, Martyn Young, addressed the issue of “contextual security”.

“It’s about who needs to get to what from where and which applications, and that can vary based on the same user accessing it from

“[It’s about] asking the business questions, and understanding what mobility can do for the business, not just selling a piece of kit”

Peter Stein (Datacom) Basil Reilly (Logicalis), Nick Beaugeard (HubOne) James Reilly (Skywire), Wayne Harper (Zebra),

Carry, Protect & ConnectTargus support a mobile work lifestyle via products, software and services to protect, carry, safeguard privacy, increase productivity and provide the connectivity required for mobile working and ABW (Activity Based Working) environments.

www.targus.com/auAU Freecall: 1800 641 645 | NZ: 0800 633 222 | [email protected]



the different platforms. So there’s the bridging of the consumption side that’s driven by the user behaviour and business policy. And that’s where security is wrapped around it.”

Young acknowledged that as applications reside anywhere for anyone, they’re not all sitting in the data centre but in the cloud. As such, he said the shift in security has moved from the perimeter to surrounding the application where it resides in addition to the user itself.

“Some applications are managed by cloud providers, some are managed by the organisation, some are managed by third parties and Software-as-a-Service, some are still residents in data centres or private cloud iterations as well.

“So, there needs to be knowledge around where the application is and how to put security around that application regardless of where it resides,” he said.

Channel opportunities The evolution of business today for partners is the fact that it’s no longer solely about box dropping or having a professional service, but making sure there’s an ongoing relationship with the client to help them evolve and drive their goals.

HubOne CEO and founder, Nick Beaugeard, said the

mobility space is huge opportunity for the industry. He mentioned that it allows the channel to take a thought leadership position into an area where traditionally, it would just be responding to a requirement.

“It’s one of those unique places where rather than just help your client with technology, you can help them with strategy, or business process. It’s more of a solution-based sell because they’ve got a problem in their business and partners can help them solve it. And that’s a good place to be.”

SkyWire chief technology officer, James Reilly, added that failing mobile strategies within a company are opportunities. He spoke about supply chain, transport and logistics operators as the verticals that would benefit the most.

“They are the ones that are probably ripe for the picking at the moment because they’ve understood the value of portable technology and their mobility strategy now is not about the terminal in the store, it’s about that interaction with the customer.”

Reilly suggested tapping into mobility-as-a-service within the early market.

“Where we’re making money is in the early market,” he said.” As soon as mobility gets into the mainstream the telcos take over and wrap it up with everything and there’s no

“You can’t do everything on a mobile phone today. It doesn’t

cut the mustard; it doesn’t solve all problems”

Defining mobility

The role of the mobile worker is

changing, fundamentally altering

the dynamics of the different

environments that they are working

in. While the traditional definition

of mobility is working anywhere

and having access to what a

person needs from everywhere,

Zebra Technologies Asia-Pacific

chief technology officer, Wayne

Harper, said there’s more to it

than just that.

Harper defined mobility as a tool

that gives customers and resellers the

right information needed to do their

business effectively in addition to

providing flexibility for the workforce.

“If you take a desktop and try to put

it down to a mobile phone, it’s not

going to give somebody true mobile

work. It’s about understanding what is

required for the enterprise to do their

businesses and how that mobile work

supports it,” he said.

Martyn Young (F5), Karl Sice (Staples) Chris Hagios (Airloom), Cam Wayland (Channel Dynamics)

WITH A GREATER VANTAGE POINT, A GREATER ADVANTAGE.

©2016 ZIH Corp and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Zebra and the stylized Zebra head are trademarks of ZIH Corp, registered in many jurisdictions worldwide.

Zebra gives you the big picture. Zebra gives you the big picture. Real-time information is key in today’s data-centric world. And Zebra’s intelligent, enterprise-level solutions provide you with instant connectivity and unrivaled visibility. See the vision at ZEBRA.com/visibility



money for people like me. Where I’m making my money is in the early market before the products and solutions cross the chasm. You need the smarts to do it.”

Reilly added that the channel has plenty of potential in the analytics space.

“What if you could do things with the edge data that you’re capturing from using devices? Doing stuff with data should be what drives the strategy around mobility. You want to get to the point where you can use real-time data.”

According to Airloom founder and CEO, Chris Hagios, translating mobility from a consumer level to an enterprise level presents partners with an opportunity to help improve user experience.

“The real opportunity lies in helping customers build out a strategy and executing to deliver this consumer experience but with all the governance that the enterprise organisations require. This solution should span across multi-vendors and multi-technologies and again, focus on end user experience,” he said.

Turner picked out the professional services, finance divisions, tertiary institutions and government departments as verticals to benefit the most from mobility.

“IT departments in these verticals are only just in their first roll out of this sort of work, maybe if they’re highly

experienced their second. There’s a massive opportunity there because they’re looking for help.”

Wayland said partners and vendors need to

communicate mobility related issues. “We’ve come across vendors that would develop a whole

range of different offerings that partners didn’t know about,” he added. “The key thing is for partners to assess mobility offerings from key vendors and work towards software or as-a-service offerings.

“So, some partners have to have a reassess of some of their vendors of what they’re actually doing and develop the skills around it.”

Niche play Beaugeard stressed the importance of niche play, through picking an industry and specialising in it which allows partners to own and hold it on their own.

“When you’re a small player, niche is always good,” he said. “You can’t be a master at everything. It’s finding an industry you can be successful in, but also start to build subject matter expertise in the vertical.

“And that means when I go and have a conversation with a client, they’re not necessarily buying the technology from me, they’re now buying my industry expertise. There aren’t a lot of people who do that.”

According to Hagios, in the mobility niche, the services and the SLA integration skills is where vendors and some of their other mobile partners make their dollars.

“As customers are transitioning to cloud, the value proposition changes significantly,” he added.

“It’s about their services and what they do in that integration.

“But there’s risk with that because you’re dealing with the vendor before their product has gone mainstream. You’re the guinea pig but they’ll use your knowledge and your ability to help them out and then when they go mainstream, someone else might benefit.”

This roundtable was sponsored by

F5 Networks, Targus, and Zebra

Technologies. Photos by Maria Stefina.

“It’s one of those unique places where rather than just help your client

with technology, you can help them with strategy, or business process”

Millennials are changing the workforce

Airloom chief technology officer, Adrian Noblett,

said millennials are driving a lot of change in

enterprise because of the consumerisation

of IT. With the younger generation in the

workforce demanding they be able to bring their

devices into the workforce, it changes the way

organisations operate.

“They’re used to being able to pick up

a device and use data and interact with an

application and get work done,” he said. “Now,

if enterprises aren’t bringing those ways of

working into the traditional workforce, that’s

not going to fundamentally change the way that

your employees are doing business, and the

efficiencies that are then driven out of the new

ways of working.”Adrian Noblett (Airloom)


54 PARTNER ROUND-UP

Customers in focus for resellers close to the coastResellers along the coast of New South Wales operate close to the big city yet experience the ways of regional life, creating opportunities and challenges along the way - Leon Spencer reports.

Bill FergusonOWNER – ITRONICS COMPUTER SPECIALISTS“Our main focus is servicing the

people of South West Rocks and the

Macleay Valley, which predominately

consist of retired folk. We provide

all aspects of IT sales and service,

including hardware, software,

networking, and servicing.

“We also provide services to SMB

customers, as well providing remote

support, planning, consulting, and

backup services. We are looking

at configuring a Seniors Computer

Course, which we would like to conduct

with local and remote customers via

remote access online meetings.

“The aged population really

needs something like this, which I

think would be very successful and

beneficial for our customer base.

“Working in a regional area has

been very rewarding and has allowed

our business to grow quite quickly.

We don’t have the competition that

you find in the metropolitan areas,

which makes it easier to be known,

and word of mouth in these areas is

crucial. This also reduces our costs

on advertising, as it is no longer

required, avoiding the large costs

required in a metropolitan area.

“I find providing service in a regional

area rewarding, as you gain a more

one-on-one personal rapport with

your customers, very much like those

you might gain in your immediate

local area within a metro area.

“Freight can be an issue outside

of a metropolitan area, but in most

cases we are serviced from Brisbane

or Sydney overnight. The other issue

you can face in a regional area is

time on the road if you are servicing

a lot of country customers.”

T he New South Wales

coastline clings to

the Pacific Ocean for

2,137km, from Tweed Heads, at

the Queensland border, to well

beyond Eden, which lies north of

the Victorian frontier.

Like most of Australia’s states

and territories, much of the NSW

population hugs the state’s coastal

region. With this large population

come businesses, and a healthy

need for IT services all the way

up and down the coast.

But outside the metropolitan

areas, businesses that prioritise

customer service, taking

time to talk to customers,

understand needs, and carefully

explain solutions, can receive

rich dividends for such an

attentive focus.

“We don’t have the competition that you find in the metropolitan areas”


PARTNER ROUND-UP 55

Ben LuckCTO – CRYSTAL TEC“In Byron Bay, we provide managed services to small, large and enterprise sized businesses based in the Northern Rivers region of NSW and south-east Queensland (QLD). At present, our focus is on extending our business reach in QLD.

“We also want to improve our monitoring and reporting efficiencies, and offer services and support to help businesses adapt to converging technologies.

“Among the main challenges we face in our part of the market is selling proactive solutions to regional businesses. Such businesses are often risk averse and wary of making an investment in what they really need, in terms of new technologies and services that would create more efficiencies or greater market opportunities for them.

“Regional clients tend to expect a very personal level of service that a larger, metro client would not. This is important in maintaining the business relationship in the regional context, although it often results in clients preferring a dedicated IT engineer to work with.

“This conflicting goal poses a challenge in growing an IT business, as it puts a strain on human resources and can make account management more delicate.”

Paul MeyerOWNER – INTERBIT COMPUTING“It’s difficult to get more people to

walk through the door, so my current

focus is on three new services.

Firstly, the team is finalising a

computer backup service targeting

small businesses; second, we are

looking at on-line retailing; finally,

we are expanding our remote

support platform.

“The two main differences between

a regional shop such as mine and

one in the city are logistics and rent.

I have ample off street parking, away

from the main street, and my rent

is low in comparison. That makes it

easier for me to be competitive on

price and provide easy accessibility

to customers with transport.

“My customer base is largely ‘Mum

and Dad’ computer users. Generally,

their knowledge of computers is basic,

so they need good advice delivered

in language and terms they can

understand. As home users, they

do not have a lot of money and are

particularly sensitive to prices.

“In Fairy Meadow, my customers

are more leisurely and don’t mind

sharing ‘war stories’ on my time and

not paying for it.

“I also receive more feedback

and positive satisfaction from my

customers in a week, than I think

I would in 40 years of corporate

IT. People appreciate what we

do – they value the service and are

willing to say so.”

Michael JanosOWNER AND FRANCHISEE – COMPUTER TROUBLESHOOTERS“Being in contact with the other

80 [Computer Troubleshooters]

franchisees provides an insight into

the differences between working in

the regions and metropolitan centres.

“For the business clients to use

the best business-level solutions is

a hard sell, and we tend to have to

provide the best solution we can at

a lower cost. I get quite a lot of work

originating from large managed

service providers when they cannot

perform something remotely.

“Most of the metro franchisees

tend to prefer business customers

and discourage residential

customers. Here in Nowra, we don’t

have that luxury and the majority of

my clients are residential or small

office/home office (SOHO).

“However, this isn’t a problem,

as most country people are very

friendly and trusting and a pleasure

to work with. The danger, of course,

is that if you are dishonest or inept,

everybody knows.

“The other thing about working

on the coast is that you get a large

range of clients. My richest client is

a billionaire and, at the other end, a

lot of my clients can barely survive

from week-to-week.

“As for planning, the only way I

can grow is to reduce the distance

I travel. This mainly involves

concentrating my marketing

activities on my local area and

raising prices on customers further

from my home base.

“Other than that, my focus is on

selling customers services where I

can make ongoing commissions. I

am trying to develop a contract that

would be attractive to residential

clients as well as SOHOs.”

“It’s difficult to get more people to walk through the door”

“Regional clients tend to expect a very personal level of service that a larger, metro client would not”


56 SECRET RESELLER

How will Dell EMC impact resellers?

ARN’s partners inside the industry lift the lid on the real world of the channel.

Dell’s relationship with the channel

is still struggling.

But in some ways, this is simply

revisiting Dell’s past. What we need

to know as resellers is what will

happen in the future.

As a word of warning to any

vendor, the term “business as usual”

simply doesn’t cut it when appeasing

the channel – our businesses are

based around vendor technologies.

While I appreciate a deal of this

magnitude cannot be completed

overnight, and that teething issues

will naturally arise, isn’t it time for

more clarity with regards to how the

deal will play out locally?

Resellers have a list of questions

that they need answering, such as…

1) How are account managers

being compensated?

2) Who owns the account – Dell or

EMC staff?

3) When will we have a clear channel

strategy for the future?

In fairness, the Dell EMC confusion

is not the first time the channel has

been left out in the cold – the same

happened during the HP and Compaq

merger in 2002, and that went badly

wrong in the eyes of the customer.

When the rubber hits the road,

EMC has a much stronger channel

pedigree than Dell and it would

be a relief to see its go-to-market

strategy win out in the end.

But of course Dell bought EMC,

not the other way around, which

means the market will have to wait

to see what aspects of each vendor

will come through in the combined

channel strategy.

For partners wanting to submit their

views anonymously, please get in touch

via [email protected]

st y t t e d o t e ea o d o t e c a

I n case you’ve been living under

a rock the size of Ayers, the

biggest technology deal in

history closed last month.

Bringing together two titans

of industry in Dell and EMC,

understandably, resellers remain

nervous as to how such a merger

will play out in the channel.

The obvious aspect is the

coming together of two gigantic

multinationals, forming a tech

behemoth that stands to be as

predictable as a toddler with a new toy.

Clearly, the channel is the toy and

at this stage, resellers don’t know

whether this toy will be played with

gently or chewed to bits.

Generally, EMC has been a

channel friendly vendor with strong

enterprise roots. Yes, a focus on

larger accounts means that some

partners simply don’t get on the

radar, but the company has a great

depth of knowledge in its sales and

technical staff across Australia.

But history shows that Dell has

a chequered past with its resellers.

It’s common knowledge that

Michael Dell pursued a direct strategy

for many years, with partners forever

‘Getting Dell’d’ by his insistence

on his own direct sales channels

competing against resellers in deals.

To Dell’s credit, change is

happening locally, but many partners

still remember being burnt on

deals, either through registrations

or engagement.

From personal dealings, Dell has

always deployed a straightforward

type of salesperson – forever on the

phone but lacking in deep technical

knowledge of the products.

This approach makes it harder to

train my sales team given the lack of

support on a day-to-day basis, and

the reality for most resellers is that

“The term “business as usual” simply

doesn’t cut it in terms of

appeasing the channel”


58 THE HOT LIST

InfrontAllan KingMANAGING DIRECTOR

NUMBER OF STAFF: 47

AGE OF COMPANY:

18 YEARS

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: Infront

is the hybrid cloud

company. Infront’s

offerings are unique in

the market, having been

developed from the

ground up over three

years to support our

customer’s journey to

hybrid cloud. Our Insight

consultants are leading

business transformation

using experience and

IP developed over

the past three years.

Our Unity reference

architecture is

engineered for

customer success,

integrating technologies

to deliver hybrid

cloud outcomes

without compromising

on security,

governance or control.

Our Prime managed

service was established

as a “cloud centre

of excellence” to

provide the skills and

support necessary

to help customers

close the innovations

gap that exists

between business

expectation and

current IT capability.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: Infront has always

embraced disruption

from a position of the

pragmatic enthusiast.

We work very hard to

ensure that everything

we build and every

service we offer

exceeds expectation.

As a company, we

spent more than 12

months working with

our customers to

better understand

their experiences

and perceptions of

cloud. This customer

development cycle was

instrumental in helping

us transform from a

data centre specialist

into the hybrid

cloud company.

> FUTURE PLANS: We have always been

proud of the strategic

relationships with our

customers. As they

make the move to hybrid

cloud, we will continue

to work on their behalf

to help abstract the

complexities of cloud by

engineering outcomes

without comprise. We

will work to ensure

we stay ahead of the

curve by always asking

“what’s next” and

ensure that IT closes

the innovation gap.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: Customers need to

transform the way IT

is built, consumed

and managed.

The Hot List

This regular column looks at partners on the upward move - these are the companies to watch. Each month, ARN looks at some of the companies that have risen to prominence already or are progressing beyond their start-up origins. Hafizah Osman asks business leaders to file reports on their companies.

FreshdeskSreelesh PillaiGENERAL MANAGER

NUMBER OF STAFF: 500 – 1000 AGE OF COMPANY: SIX YEARS

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: Freshdesk is a provider of cloud-based customer engagement software, which allows organisations to support customers through email, phone, websites, forums, and social media. Freshdesk’s products are widely used by teams and companies of all sizes, from SMB to enterprise.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: We focus on building cloud-based, simple solutions. Our solutions are intuitive and easy to use, while offering affordable pricing. That’s what makes Freshdesk different from other products on the market.

> FUTURE PLANS: We’ve recently expanded our product offering beyond customer support with the launch of Freshsales, a CRM for high-velocity sales teams, as we work to improve the entire customer journey. Our goal is to not just change the way businesses do customer service anymore; we are in it to change the way they do business.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: We recognise the paradigm shift from traditional on-premise software to cloud products, and more companies are choosing a partner-first strategy today than ever before. There are plenty of options for partners, but it is important to stay focused by selecting a maximum of five best-of-breed products and staying committed to growing each line of business, as well as building deep expertise and investing in relationships with vendors, customers and other partners.


THE HOT LIST 59

OretaSachin VermaMANAGING DIRECTOR

NUMBER OF STAFF:

20

AGE OF COMPANY:

THREE YEARS

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: We

provide cost effective

value add cloud

services, leveraging

a mix of public and

private cloud services,

enhanced with an

orchestration layer

to deliver a complete

and robust cloud

service. We want to be

the partner of choice

for organisations,

empowering them to

accelerate innovation,

expand their market

reach, and drive down

IT costs.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: Our key differentiators

are skill and product

neutrality. We are not

tethered to specific

manufacturers or

vendors, allowing us

to focus on identifying

the best solution for

customer situations.

We work with a global

network of strategic

partners so that our

customers can be

confident that our

recommendations

are unbiased and in

their best interest.

We regularly review

our partnerships

and alliances so that

we can provide our

customers with an

end-to-end service;

and with the latest and

best as part of the IT

investment.

> FUTURE PLANS: We are a Melbourne-

based company with

customers throughout

Victoria and South

Australia. Over the

next 18 months, we

are looking to expand

our operations into

New South Wales and

Queensland. From a

services point of view,

we will be looking to

exploit the nexus of

cloud and IoT.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: Expertise and talent is

the top challenge for

cloud adoption, while

focusing on the right

expertise to make the

required difference will

be key.

Evolve IT AustraliaNick MoranMANAGING DIRECTOR

NUMBER OF STAFF: 28

AGE OF COMPANY: 23

YEARS

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: Evolve IT Australia

has sustained growth

across every area of

the business in 2016.

Our Melbourne-based

team has expanded

significantly and whilst

our managed services

continues to grow and is

considered our “business

as usual”, it’s our

strategic VCIO, cloud and

project offerings to the

100-400 seat market that

remains key to acquiring

net new business and

success. As a result, this

year alone we have grown

our overall revenue by 24

per cent and continue to

expand our private and

public cloud offerings

increasing revenue by

226 per cent.

services opportunities

from those partners

looking to get out or

partner with a long term

strategy in mind.

KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: I expect the channel will

continue to accommodate

new MSP players via

acquisition, with emerging

players continuing to

enter from non-traditional

partners such as telcos,

copier/managed print

as well as professional

services organisations

such as accountants and

insurance companies.

This means that only

the IT providers who can

truly create IP offerings

and differentiate

themselves in the

marketplace will grow

and succeed long-term.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: We

have continued to work

hard to differentiate

ourselves in the small and

mid-markets and we now

have 68 per cent of our

overall revenue recurring

monthly, which provides

the perfect platform to

leverage off and invest in

our people and processes.

> FUTURE PLANS: As

we head towards 2017,

Evolve IT Australia

continues to be full

steam ahead. Client

satisfaction is our no.1

goal as we look to create

more value around

automation and client

self-service tools. From

a business acquisition

standpoint, we will

continue to seek out

small MSP and cloud

“This year alone we have grown our overall revenue by 24 per cent”


60 CHANNEL COACHING

T he modern sales environment

is constantly changing.

The growing power of

the customer has meant that

businesses accustomed to closing

a deal, selling services and walking

away, now have to prove how they

can add real value.

“Smarter buyers requires

smarter selling,” Miller Heiman

Group advisory partner, Rob

Hartnett, said. “There is more

discipline to selling today and

everyone should be taking a more

scientific approach to it.”

According to Hartnett, partners

can improve sales strategy by

examining four key areas of

business to create a cross functional

framework, designed to guide selling

processes and adapt to the modern

sales environment.

1 Sales EnablementIn describing sales enablement,

Hartnett said partners must

incorporate integrated content,

training and coaching services for

salespeople and frontline managers

along the entire customer lifecycle.

“A sales enablement process

will continue to become more

important as buyers become

more sophisticated and also

harder to connect with directly,”

he said. “We are finding

marketing having a stronger

role to play not only in lead

generation, but throughout the

buying and selling process to

ensure your brand and message

resonates continually.”

Top 4 modern sales techniques for partnersIn this newly created column, Holly Morgan, examines ways partners can enable growth through new strategies and approaches, reminding the channel to work on all areas of the business to enable ongoing transformation.

Hartnett advises partners to

learn everything about the customer

and various customer situations,

insisting “you are never done. Sales

transformation isn’t an event.”

3 Talent Acquisition and ongoing Management

For Harnett, “innate talent” is not

necessarily taught. Rather, it is

recurring patterns of thoughts,

feelings and behaviours.

“When you think about

talent, you have to have a deep

understanding of what drives their

performance,” he explained. “Then,

you replicate it. That is how you

‘develop’ top talent.

“I believe talent, plus skills that

can be developed, times the culture

in which a person works, equals

performance. When you think about

what drives performance in your

people, it’s partly what they were

born to do and partly the skills

they acquire, their training and the

culture in which they operate.”

4 Business AcumenIn today’s business climate,

by the time a sales executive meets

with the C-level team, they must

have a deep understanding of their

“social style”.

“Simply getting to top executives

– those who make the final decisions

– just doesn’t cut it anymore,”

Hartnett added. “Knowing what they

respond to and most importantly

how they make decisions, means

you can crack that code and selling

instantly becomes easier.

“In the end, it’s not about your

style. It’s about theirs. Don’t get

trapped by your way of doing things.

Provide the same content, but

deliver in a way that is tailored to

the customer.”

2 Sales TransformationAs customer expectations

heighten, the buying process has

become lengthy and more complex

in the modern era. Hartnett said

partners can only add value by offering

perspective during the sales process.

“Sales has evolved a great deal,”

he added. “It used to be you showed

up, threw all of your products and

solutions on the table and asked,

‘What do you want to buy?’ Today,

that approach isn’t good enough.

You have to add value during the

sales process, not just when the

contract is signed. That is how you

differentiate yourself in the market.”

“In the end, it’s not about your style. It’s about theirs”

Rob Hartnett


62 COMMUNITY/ARN ICT INDUSTRY AWARDS 2016


ARN ICT INDUSTRY AWARDS 2016/COMMUNITY 63

ARN ICT Industry Awards 2016The channel came together to toast the top-performing players within Australia, at the 10th ARN ICT Industry Awards in Sydney.Photos by Maria Stefina and Yulia Photography.


64 COMMUNITY/WIICTA ALUMNAE Q3

ARN is printed by Offset Alpine Printing under International Environmental Management standard ISO 14001.

The paper used is manufactured from sustainable plantation timber sourced from certified forests.

EnvironmentISO 14001

Editorial published in ARN may not be reproduced in any form whatsoever without

written permission. Copyright 2016, IDG Communications

ARN is published by IDG Communications Pty Ltd

PO Box 1753, North Sydney, NSW, 2059. Phone: (02) 9902 2700

IDG is the publisher of ARN and its website (www.arnnet.com.au). If you choose

to accept offers, enter competitions or complete surveys contained within them

you may be required to provide information about yourself to IDG. IDG will use

this information to provide you with products or services you have requested,

and may supply your information to contractors that help IDG to do this. IDG

may also use your information to inform you of other IDG publications, products,

services and events, or give your information to organisations that are providing

special prizes or offers and that are clearly associated with the offer. Unless

you tell us not to, we may give your information to other organisations that

may use it to inform you about other products, services or events or to give

to other organisations that may use it for this purpose. To gain access to the

information IDG holds about you, please contact IDG’s Privacy Officer at IDG

Communications Pty Ltd, Level 10, 15 Blue St, North Sydney, NSW, 2060.

ADVERTISING ACCOUNT DIRECTOR: Cherry Yumul

[email protected] (02) 9902 2756

ACCOUNT DIRECTOR: Eduardo Silva [email protected] (02) 9902 2769

ACCOUNT DIRECTOR: Kirsti Rae [email protected] (02) 9902 2736

E VENTS MANAGER: Alexandra West [email protected] (02) 9902 2775

DATABASE CO-ORDINATOR: NIK GORBACHE V [email protected] (02) 9902 2784

MARKETING AND E VENTS COORDINATOR: MARIA STEFINA [email protected] (02) 9902 2737

E VENTS COORDINATOR: REBECCA HAHN [email protected] (02) 9902 2778

MANAGING DIRECTOR: Davy Adams

IDG FOUNDER: Patrick J McGovern

PRESIDENT AND PUBLISHER: Susan Searle [email protected]

EDITORIAL EDITOR:James Henderson

[email protected]

DEPUT Y EDITOR: Hafizah Osman

[email protected]

SENIOR JOURNALIST: Leon Spencer

[email protected]

JOURNALISTS: Chris Player

[email protected]

Holly Morgan [email protected]

AD INDEXAPC 37ARROW 25AVNET 29CYLANCE 45F5 53HP 5, 9HPE 39I-LAN 61

INGRAM MICRO COVER WRAP OFR, IFR, IFC, IBC, 2,3, 21INTEL 33LENOVO OBC, 16, 17TARGUS 49VERITAS 15WELLS FARGO 43ZEBRA 51

1. Margrith Appleby (Lenovo) 2. Megan Hastie (Education Queensland) and Hafizah Osman (ARN) 3. Margrith Appleby (Lenovo), Athena Thompson (rhipe), Meryl Palma (Hosted Network) 4. Anastasia Chernyshova (Veeam), Lauren Escalona (Datto) 5. Tanya Hovagimian (The Missing Link), Sophie Vigors (Distribution Central) 6. Michelle Zamora (IBM), Nicolette Moore (Optus Business), Maree Lowe (ASI Solutions) 7. Theresa Fletcher (SAP), Margaret Welna (Artis Group), Ainsley Wilkinson (APC by Schneider Electric) 8. Susan Searle (ARN), Maree Lowe (ASI Solutions), Angela Chan (APC by Schneider Electric), Michelle Zamora (IBM)

1 2

3

5

7

8

6

4

WIICTA ALUMNAE Q3The inaugural WIICTA Alumnae Q3 breakfast, held at the Establishment in Sydney, brought together WIICTA award winners and finalists to facilitate a mentoring-style program to support women working in the technology sector. Key messages and conversations revolved around the importance of integrity, careering planning and coping with disappointment.Photos by Maria Stefina

Logon to au.ingrammicro.com | Call 1300 651 124Terms and Conditions: Aruba promotional period is 1 August – 31 October 2016, or while stocks last, whichever comes first. For every $10,000ex GST of eligible Aruba products

Purchase Aruba Networking and You

$469 ex GST $669 ex GST $869 ex GST $1,475 ex GST

, 4GHZ & 5GHZ,

Dual Dual Outdoor

Directional Antennas

closer to a $500 Flight Centre Voucher!

$500 Flight Centre voucher each time you purchase

HPE V4 Server and MS ROK Bundles PLUS $200...

Documents

Transcript of HPE V4 Server and MS ROK Bundles PLUS $200...