Changing Channels

Episode 32: Unitrends MSP’s Mike Sanders on Spinning Out to Success

Technology companies hear all the time that innovation is the means to sustained success. In reality, though, legacy culture, processes, and business structures often suffocate innovation from becoming a success. Unitrends, an established backup technology vendor, devised a plan for launching into the managed services market. Rather than just forming a new business unit or simple product offering, Unitrends spun out its fledgling venture as a separate company, Unitrends MSP, in the belief it would thrive unencumbered by the legacy organization. Unitrends MPS CEO Mike Sanders joins Pod2112 to talk about spinoffs as a development and growth strategy.

 

Episode 31: PlanetOne Communications’ Ted Schuman on Cloud Expectations

Cloud adoption is on the raise, as businesses continue to expand their use of cloud-based infrastructure, applications and support services. Reselling through partners provides a means for reaching customers and covering the total addressable market. Resellers adding cloud services to their portfolio and vendors indiscriminately adding partners to their programs isn’t necessarily effective. Vendors and distributors, says PlanetOne Communications CEO Ted Schuman, should establish standards and instill performance expectations in their cloud channel programs.

 

Episode 30: Office Depot’s Janet Schijns & Michelle McBain on Growing SMBs IT Services

Small and midsize businesses are not smaller versions of enterprises. They do not have the IT staffing and budget resources of the much larger counterparts. But IT resources aren’t the only thing they lack. SMBs often don’t have the complement of back office resources or infrastructure for many of the functions required for well-structured and efficient business operations. IT and business services are a means by which SMBs obtain the technology, support and materials they need to drive their businesses forward. Office Depot’s Janet Schijns, executive vice president and chief merchant and services officer, and Michelle Ragusa McBain, director of technology sales and services, join Pod2112 to talk about the growing need and opportunity for business services in the SMB segment.

 

Episode 29: Lenovo’s Sammy Kinlaw on Making Hardware Exciting in a Services World

Vendors and solution providers love services for their predictable revenue and high profitability. Services are so popular that the industry is racing to make every product a service. So how do traditional hardware vendors keep their partners engaged and excited about selling legacy and commoditized hardware products? How do hardware vendors attach their PCs, servers and appliances to next-generation services? Sammy Kinlaw, vice president of Lenovo North America Channel and U.S. SMB market segment, is working on just that challenge. Kinlaw joins Pod2112 to discuss how services are enhancing and opening opportunities for partners that sell and support traditional hardware products.

Episode 28: Platte River Networks’ David DeCamillis on Crisis Management Planning

No one thinks a crisis will befall their business until a CNN van rolls into their parking lot. When that happens, it's outright chaos. Colorado-based solution provider Platte River Networks had that very thing happen to it in 2016 when news broke that it was the administrator of the controversial email server of then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. Overnight, Platte River was thrust into the national spotlight, intensely scrutinized by the press, investigators, politicians and customers. Platte River's vice president of sales and marketing, David DeCamillis, joins Pod2112 to talk about lessons learned from that experience and why it's imperative that every company have a crisis management contingency plan.

Episode 27: Microsoft’s Gavriella Schuster on Balancing Competition in Partnerships

No vendor can provide for all the market’s technology needs, which is why many partner to build greater value by making their products interoperable and combining their go-to-market sales resources. However, partnership doesn’t mean frictionless. In many cases, partnering vendors are also competing with overlapping products and services. Microsoft’s Gavriella Schuster says accepting that you’re sometimes a partner and sometimes a competitor is necessary for finding success in the complex technology market.

Episode 26: Aerohive’s Michael O’Brien on Turning WiFi into Business Intelligence

The mobile workforce makes wireless networks imperative. Many managed service providers are incorporating managed wireless networking as part of their offerings. But a few industrious MSPs are making a leap forward by helping end users leverage data gleaned from WiFi networks into actionable business intelligence. Turning WiFi into BI is no simple matter, but has great potential for generating higher value engagements for MSPs and their vendors. Wireless networking vendor Aerohive’s Michael O’Brien joins Pod2112 to discuss how MSPs are tapping into the business intelligence opportunities with managed WiFi.

Episode 25: Anitian’s Andrew Plato on Everything Wrong with the VAR Model

Vendors often talk about the importance of “ease of doing business” with partners. Many partners, though, are moving away from the reseller model in favor of their own services. The reason: Vendors are anything but easy when it comes to enabling partners to resell product. Former VAR turned service provider Andrew Plato of security specialist Anitian joins Pod2112 to discuss everything that’s wrong with the conventional vendor-partner reseller model and why reselling product is increasingly less advantageous. Every vendor needs to hear this.

Episode 24: Cisco’s Michelle Ragusa-McBain on Empowering Women in Tech

Women make up more than half the population, but remain underrepresented the technology industry. That’s changing thanks to the advocacy and support efforts of several enablement groups, which help aspiring women establish and cultivate technology careers. Michelle Ragusa-McBain, a customer and partner experience manager at Cisco and chairperson of the CompTIA Advancing Women in Technology community, joins Pod2112 to discuss the need for supporting women’s technology careers and the resources available to aspiring and establish technology-career minded women.

Episode 23: Intermedia’s Mike Gold on Avoiding Cloud Commoditization

As much as cloud computing is transforming the way technology is consumed and opening new opportunities for vendors and channel partners, it is not immune to the forces of commoditization. Many cloud-based services have already shed their original value, resulting in a loss of their profitability. Avoiding commoditization requires continual innovation and the addition of value-added services. Mike Gold, CEO of Intermedia, joins Pod2112 to discuss what it takes to beat back commoditization and maintain profitability for vendors and partners alike.