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CHANNEL | BUSINESS | TECHNOLOGY | COMMUNITY

APRIL 2016 | Vol. 21 No. 3APRIL 2016 | V lV 21 N 3APRIL 2016 | Vol.VV 21 No.NN 3

CONTRIBUTORS

MARTIN ANDERSON

BARRY ASSAF

GREG BARNES

JAMES BYRNE

PHIL CAMERON

BRIAN CORRIGAN

MADHU DUBEY

MARK FIORETTO

DEAN HODGSON

MARK JONES

WILLIAM KESTIN

NITIN KUCHARA

NINA MCMAHON

PIP MARLOW

KEITH MASTERTON

MOHEB MOSES

MARK RANSOM

FRANK SKIFFINGTON

JOHN WALTERS

JAMIE WARNER

RHODY BURTON

JAMES HENDERSON

SCOTT ATKINSON

RUSSELL BASKERVILLE

RAPHAEL BLANCHET

RUSSELL FRANCIS

BEN TOWN

IBM’s channel solutionRHODY BURTON

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arnnet.com.au | APRIL 2016 |

CONTENTS 1

AprilREGULARS

6 News10 Appointments48 Networking49 Storage50 Telecommunications51 Acquisitions58 Products60 Apps61 Community

COLUMNS

2 Editorial Tipping the next big thing is rather like playing needle

in a haystack. Security, unified communications,

Internet of Things - they all have friends.

4 Guest Editor Brian Corrigan reflects on his lengthy stint

at ARN as editor, then editorial director, from

December 2003 to September 2008.

8 Partner round-up As Tasmanian ICT companies enter a period of

maturity, the development and implementation

of a coherent industry wide strategy is of critical

importance to inform strategic pathways for

growth and development.

12 The hot list Each month this column looks at partners on the

upward move. These are the companies to watch.

14 MSP/Compensation Noted analyst, Moheb Moses, explains why

you can’t change your business if you don’t

change compensation.

15 Thought leadership Mark Jones says forget how to be a great leader but

instead ask why are you a leader in the first place?

16 25 years

The tale of how distie giant and market leader,

Tech Pacific, was eventually sold in 2003, reads

like a chess game. Mike Gee follows the moves as

we look back on 25 years of ARN.

46 Words from the wise Hall of Fame inductees, Phil Cameron and Pip

Marlow, offer valuable pointers and insights for

all channel players in 2016.

56 The workplace

Having a pool party as your next work function?

Make sure you encourage good behaviour and

responsible drinking. Madhu Dubey explains why.

INTERVIEWS

20 IBM’s channel solution

IBM A/NZ director of global business partners,

Rhody Burton, sat down with ARN in a very candid

and personal discussion about her journey into

IT, lessons learned along the way, and some

personal insights and even unknown facts.

30 Scoring goals with ARN

James Henderson has crossed the Tasman to

take up the reins as Editor at ARN after a stint

running Reseller News in New Zealand.

FEATURES

24 Buy vs. Build? The changing dynamics of the datacentre

EMC and VCE opened up the Buy vs. Build debate

alongside key distributor partners and resellers

at an exclusive ARN Roundtable.

34 IoT and Big Data: the disruption starts here

ARN deputy editor, HAFIZAH OSMAN, takes a look

at the two biggest market disruptors for 2016 -

IoT and Big Data - and highlights the growing and

evolving partner opportunity.

40 Flash Forward: The storage evolution

This roundtable considered the latest trends

in the storage market, highlighted where flash

technology makes sense, and examined the market

opportunities for businesses and service providers.

52 The future of IT

It’s a software-driven, open source world, and

we’re just living in it, according to bernard

golden, who delivers four tenets for the future

of the IT industry.

3020

24

40

| APRIL 2016 | arnnet.com.au

2 EDITORIAL

Needle in a haystack

I t was a bit like playing needle

in a haystack for real. There

we were at the 2016 Judges’

Networking Lunch, the opener for

the 2016 ARN ICT Industry Awards

season, and the more I chatted,

the more I became aware of one

fundamental thing: Most people

were betting on different horses

when it came to the next big IT play.

And I mean the ‘anything but Cloud’

play. The truth is, if you aren’t making

a Cloud play by now, then maybe

you shouldn’t be. There are lots of

people on the Cloud offering every

imaginable play. There is little room

for little guys trying to get a toe-hold.

At least one industry analyst is

prepared to bet that sometime in the

next 12 months, the Cloud fallout

will begin as small companies,

unable to deal with small margins,

simply go under or bail out.

Smart start-ups are positioining

themselves around Cloud add-ons,

extras, new solutions, cleverware.

The big boys will slug this one

out. Let’s face it, even the disties are

giving it a go.

AN EYE FOR SECURITYSo where to look for that elusive

money-making sector that offers

opportunity? I had a fascinating chat

at the Lunch with FireEye Regional

Alliance Manager, Chris Barton, who

is seeing his company deliver stellar

growth (and I mean stellar) in a

sector that can’t possibly not grow.

Let’s face it: Data, data, and more

data equals never ending increased

need for security. Every business needs

security and as we agreed, not cheapo

security where the holes are so big the

hackers don’t even need to hack. They

evolution of the workplace, driven

by the rise of the digital office,

and unified communications

in particular. “Without emerging

unified communications technology,

workplace evolution and the shift

to remote working would not be

possible,” he noted. So pencil in UCC

as an area worth exploring.

AND THEN THERE’S IOT…The perennial Internet of Things

was muttered about as a strong

possibility and lots of big, big money

is currently going into IoT. Has it

arrived? No. Will it eventually arrive?

Well, yes, logically, it has to as both

business and home become more

and more technologically dependent.

So, as one person said, start testing

the water now, find a nice pool, and

start wading in. But be careful.

You know, it all reminds me of a

comment made to me years ago by

a very savvy industry guru who said

that when disruption and confusion

reign and infrastructure is being

remoulded, opportunity is at its

greatest. I’m going with that now.

NEW EDITORFinally, I’d like to welcome James

Henderson to the position of ARN

Editor. He will be the face of ARN and

a contact point for many of you. As

such, this will be my last editorial.

It’s been fun for five years. Now

James can start scratching his head

and pondering the mysteries of the

channel in search of some wise words

each month. I have no doubt that he

will succeed.

Mike GeeEditorial Director, ARN

just walk in and take what they want. So

a security play would be good, although

Barton did make an interesting

observation when he said that

perhaps the future in security looks so

lucrative that the big boys like Google

and Microsoft might well want to come

and play. That remains to be seen.

HOW ABOUT UNIFIED COMMUNICATIONS?Somebody else was a big proponent

of unified communications and

collaboration (UCC). Now I admit I

am not the biggest know-all when it

comes to UCC but rather fortuitously,

and coincidentally, that morning I

had written a story about Ingram

Micro in the US acquiring NETXUSA,

a UCC value-added distributor

focused on VOIP solutions and IP

phones for telecommunications

service providers and resellers.

It was an interesting buy. Ingram

said, in a statement, that NETXUSA

complemented its established UCC

business, bringing a strong portfolio

of IP communications products from

companies such as Cisco, Digium,

Edgewater, Polycom and Yealink.

This got me thinking that Ingram

wasn’t making a UCC add-on move

unless it saw some real potential in

this market. And where the big boys

roam, the rest of you should be taking

notice because opportunity beckons.

Consider this: 2014 research

findings reported a 26 per cent

increase in open remote job postings

compared to the prior year, with hiring

managers expecting many more to

come over the next five years.

Wavelink MD, lan Rubin, told

Reseller News NZ recently that

this change reflects the continuing

”It all reminds me of a comment made to me years ago by a very savvy industry guru who told me that when disruption and confusion reign and

infrastructure is being remoulded, opportunity is at its greatest”


4 25 YEARS/GUEST EDITOR

You know those moments when something takes

you back to a different time and place in your life? Well I had one recently as I sat in a North Sydney boardroom waiting for a client. I was checking the tech news when I saw that Ingram Micro was being sold to a Chinese investment company for $US6 billion.

Suddenly I was transported back to my old desk in St Leonards, it was 2004 and we were breaking news that Ingram Micro was acquiring its biggest rival in the region, Tech Pacific. Could that really be 12 years ago?

A lot has happened in the Australian IT industry since then but it seems the more things change, the more they stay the same. Phil Sim, another former ARN editor, noted in these pages recently that Dell’s direct model and online competitors were supposed to kill the channel back in the dotcom days.

We know now that the channel adjusted and this never happened. In my time as editor, Cloud computing sounded the alarm bells but, once again, smart channel operators have found a way to stay relevant as the world around them changes.

As you’d expect in an industry defined by change, there has been plenty of

Staying relevant as the world around you changesBrian Corrigan, Guest Editor

Brian

Corrigan,

Guest Editor

A lot has happened in the Australian IT industry … but it seems the more things change, the more they stay the same.

consolidation. Rumours of Express Data being up for sale were never too far away but few would have considered Dicker Data as a potential suitor. Chalk and cheese doesn’t even begin to describe that cultural match up but David Dicker knows a thing or two about this business. I would never bet against him.

Looking back, ARN also changed significantly during my spell in the editor’s chair. Our weekly page counts shrank dramatically as advertisers pushed more of their spending online, but we became a more active part of the community as our business reacted to changing market conditions.

We formed stronger relationships with industry leaders by starting a series of roundtable talkfests and, encouraged by this success, launched an annual awards

evening that has gone from strength to strength. I’m immensely proud of the team that launched the ARN IT Industry Awards.

When I left ARN for The Australian Financial Review I never completely lost sight of the channel. Listed service providers like Data#3, Oakton, SMS Management & Technology and UXC were on my beat.

Now, I’m running the content marketing division of Spectrum Group, a tech-focused communications agency. In a funny twist of fate, IDG Communications has relocated since I left the business and I’m now based in the same building as the current ARN team. It’s a small world.

Brian Corrigan was Editor and then

Editorial Director of ARN from December

2003 to September 2008.

3O B S E R VAT I O N S

1

SMART CHANNEL

OPERATORS

HAVE FOUND A

WAY TO STAY

RELEVANT AS THE

WORLD AROUND

THEM CHANGES

2

IN AN INDUSTRY

DEFINED BY

CHANGE, THERE

HAS BEEN

PLENTY OF

CONSOLIDATION

3

WE BECAME A

MORE ACTIVE

PART OF THE

COMMUNITY AS

OUR BUSINESS

REACTED TO

CHANGING MARKET

CONDITIONS


6 NEWS/DISTRIBUTION

T he dust had barely settled on

the shock sale of Ingram Micro

to Chinese company, Tianjin

Tianhai, for $US6 billion, when rumours

gathered rapidly that oft-mooted but never

concluded sale of Distribution Central was

on the cards and about to drop.

A Friday of whispers turned into a

Monday morning of confirmation, as

March 14 opened with an early email

from Arrow vice-president, global

communications, John Hourigan,

announcing the company had finally

snared the offspring of Scott Frew and

Nick Verykios.

Finally! We’ve asked Scott and Nick five

or six times in the past two years, ‘Are you

selling to Arrow?’ It had been the most

consistent of rumours. And, to be fair, Frew

has always said, ‘If somebody walks in the

door tomorrow with the right amount of

money, I’ll sell.’ This time he did.

Arrow was suitably happy: "The addition

of Distribution Central to our presence in

the region expands and strengthens Arrow’s

business in the value-added distribution

marketplace,"

It’s president of Global Enterprise

Computing Solutions, Sean Kerins, said.

"This acquisition supports our strategy to

expand Arrow’s portfolio and build strategic

capabilities to help meet the evolving needs

of our customers."

The buyout follows Arrow's acquisition

of Observatory Crest in October 2014,

a distributor of IT security solutions

and services based in Sydney. "The

combination of Distribution Central

and our capabilities from the earlier

Observatory Crest acquisition makes

Arrow the leading value-added distributor

in the region," Kerins added.

JEWEL IN THE CROWNBut the real jewel in this crown, as far as

Arrow was concerned, was announced on

February 11 when Hewlett Packard Enterprise

– after an extensive review of its Australian

processes – chose Distribution Central as

one of its distribution partners for 2016 and

beyond. A month later, the DC deal was done.

The gossip mill had Ingram Micro (a few

days before it was sold to China), Avnet,

Arrow, and Westcon, in the queue to buy DC

depending on who was on the end of the

phone. But if this was horse race, Arrow

was Black Caviar – unlikely to be beaten to

the prize.

So an iconic Australian distie bites

the dust. But at the ARN Judges’ Lunch,

the real question being bantered around

was ‘What happens next?’ And ‘Where is

distribution heading?’

One long-time industry observer confided,

“Every Australian distributor, bar two, is

up for sale right now. But the price tags

are too high. Wait and see what happens

though when the prices come down a little.”

FURTHER CONSOLIDATIONNo matter who you talk to, it seems that

further consolidation is inevitable. The

massive Chinese companies have started

2016 with $23.8 billion of outbound deals so

far this year, according to data compiled by

Bloomberg. After just 48 days of 2016, that’s

already closing in on the record of $US25.6

billion announced during the whole of last

year. China watchers say it is just the start.

Frew questions the current distributor

landscape, asking for definition around the

term “value-add”. “What does it mean?”

he asks. “Distributors now say they are

value-add but what do they add? Most have

no engineering resources for example,

and resellers work out quickly whether the

story stands up or not. Yes, distributors

need a good vendor to sell, but it’s also

about wrapping all of those things around

a product that will save and make resellers

money. And that’s all it boils down to.”

HEADY ROADOver 12 years, Distribution Central burned

a heady road. “When Distribution Central

opened up, Ingram Micro was hitting a few

billions, Westcon was hitting around half a

billion and all of the big boys were already

in play,” he recalled. “There was no room

for a distributor to come in but we did and

we made it to number six.”

Frew believes the future for his now-

ended project is bright: “Distribution

Central will have no problem shooting

through the $450 million mark this year and

with Arrow’s backing, I see no reason why

that won’t continue to grow in the future."

But he won’t be here to see that. He was

set to leave Australia on April 12 for a new

home in Surrey, England, where he will run

his real pet project, iasset.com – a potential

billion-dollar baby. Verykios will stay for now.

And so the distribution landscape

settles once again, but for how long? The

smart money says not long at all.

Arrows buys DC - what does it mean?

Frew’s bottom line

“The reason I picked Arrow to be the acquirer is because they need everyone of our staff on the ground in Australia. If one of the local global distributors had been the acquirer, it would have destroyed operations and accounts and that was a key consideration.”

Is this true?

“Every Australian distributor, bar two, is up for sale right now. But the price tags are too high. Wait and see what happens though when the prices come down a little.”

Mike Gee and James Henderson

Scott Frew Nick Verykios

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8 PARTNER ROUND-UP

Tasmania - challenges, growthTasmanian-based IT service providers and tech innovators experience similar challenges to other states in terms of attracting IT skills and retaining talent. But securing useful, experienced and current advice for their tech investments, is another issue they face. JULIA TALEVSKI speaks to partners about some of the opportunities and challenges they’re facing this year.

William KestinTASICT CEO

Tasmania is

experiencing an IT

renaissance of

creativity and

expansion at the

moment. The industry is

growing, helped by the cabling

underneath Bass Strait and the

state receiving the nbn roll-out

before all other states. This is

providing opportunities for

remote areas to sustain

start-ups, which encourages

companies to enjoy regional

lifestyles while staying connected

to the rest of the world.

Whether it is a Launceston

IT business surpassing the $100

million sales mark or a Hobart

company, whose software has

just been purchased by the

largest bank in the US, many

success stories show Tasmania

punching above its weight.

However, the challenges

for Tasmania include the lack

of properly educated and

trained staff coming out of our

university and TAFE to fulfil

the expansion needs of some

companies and the lack of VC

companies, and in part the

government, properly investing

in the growth of our industry.

David MooreI HATE MY PC FOUNDER

As a mobile

computer support

business servicing

homes and SMBs,

the main

challenges I see in the

Tasmanian market is the

ongoing struggle to obtain

decent Internet connectivity.

While parts of Tasmania

have been early to wonderful

speeds, most of the people I

deal with are struggling with

ADSL (and not even ADSL2+),

old satellite, or patchy

Next G services.

Those who have been

lucky enough to get onto nbn

services are often treated to

poor customer service. I often

get called out to a new nbn

installation only to find that

it isn’t actually working; then

it becomes a battle to get an

nbn technician back.

The attractiveness of

Tasmania’s low population

density is also its Achilles

heel. It can be difficult and

uneconomical to get decent

service and product delivery

to people in more remote

locations. It’s kind of sad to say,

but simply by being punctual,

honest, following up and

showing empathy, I’ve been

able to build a good customer

base in a rural area.

Nina McMahonELAN PROJECTS LEADING DIRECTOR

This year has

been all about

growing our

PopUp Wi-Fi

product. We work

right around Australia, bringing

Wi-Fi for events like Stereosonic,

Dark MOFO, Gympie Music

Muster and Ad:Tech. Companies

like Sony, Boost Mobile, Nissan

and Vodka O sponsor the Wi-Fi

that we customise for them. We

also bring fast Internet for

crowds anywhere.

While our company is

Tasmanian-based, 12 months

ago one of our co-founders,

Linden Kurth, moved to Sydney

to service the mainland.

Our clients are production

companies, festival, event and

conference organisers.

We face two key challenges

in running our business from

Tasmania. The first is securing

investment to scale PopUp Wi-

Fi. This is to meet an already-

surging demand for our

services nationally. The other,

is particular to our business

model and relates to a lack of

Tasmanian population density

– there are simply fewer

events with sufficient budget to

engage with us.

We are constantly staggered

by the enormous disparity

between the affluence on the

mainland and in Tasmania.

Basing an office in Sydney has

definitely been the difference

between sinking or swimming.

They are wealthier and always

hungry for the next innovation

that will give their event a

further point of difference

and profitability. People in

Tasmania still ask us “does it

work?”. 200 events under our

belts, yet we frequently get

emails from people we’ve never

met simply booking the service

in Sydney.

As Tasmanian ICT companies

enter a period of maturity, the

development and implementation

of a coherent industry wide

strategy is of critical importance

to inform strategic pathways

for growth and development

- TASICT AND IN-TELLINC

of Tasmanian ICT companies produced a product or service for sale in ICT marketsof ppro58% p

uct or service for s- TASICT INDUSTRY SURVEY RESULTS

PARTNER ROUND-UP 9

On a different note, we

have noticed an interesting

trend taking place. Our

mainland clients are generally

enthusiastic and supportive

that we are a Tasmanian

Startup. “Brand Tasmania”

seems to extend as far. It has

been particularly noticeable in

the really positive attitude that

mainland and even overseas

clients demonstrate towards

PopUp Wi-Fi being founded and

based in Hobart.

I think a key issue to

address, in order for the tech

and innovation landscape in

Tasmania to flourish, is for

Tasmanians to identify with

the attitude that others are

increasingly gravitating towards

us. The Hobart waterfront area

is growing some of Tasmania’s

most exciting ICT companies

and provides the opportunity

to grow the Tasmanian Tech

brand through trade missions

and through local awareness of

what it all means to us.

Doing business is great in

Tassie, and getting better if

you’re clever and lucky enough

to have a revenue-based

start-up. If I was hunting for

investment for an idea, I’d

head elsewhere.

Martin AndersonIONATA DIGITAL MANAGING DIRECTOR

As a Web and

app development

agency, the main

challenge we

face is

continuing to find suitably

experienced staff as we grow

our team.

Tasmania is a fantastic

place to live and work but

there is a reduced pool of

experienced candidates for

positions as they become

available. As an agency, we

are looking to address this by

engaging with local education

institutions to meet the next

crop of developers and also

recruiting team members

from interstate. We have

recently added team members

who were keen to move to

Tasmania from Melbourne

and Adelaide.

The great thing about

working on the Internet

is that it allows us to

service customers all

around Australia and as

far away as New Zealand

and Malaysia. We help

people sell skin care

products online in Newcastle

and manage public

transport ticketing systems

in Christchurch.

Although our customers

are spread far and wide we

have made the decision not to

off-shore development work

and to focus on building a

dynamic team of developers

and creative problem solvers

in our Hobart office. We

value the creative spark that

comes from collaborating

to solve problems which is

why we continue to seek out

best available talent to join

our team.

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10 NEWS/APPOINTMENTS

EMC’s Chris Trevitt joins HPEFormer EMC A/NZ general manager of

channel sales, Chris Trevitt, has joined Hewlett

Packard Enterprise (HPE) as its director –

indirect, South Pacific Enterprise Group.

Trevitt commenced his role on March 29.

Trevitt takes over from Kaaren Lewis,

who held on to that role until January 29.

Lewis was the company’s channel, SMB,

and alliances indirect sales director. The

company’s SMB country manager, Nicholas

Lambrou, took on Lewis’ responsibilities, in

addition to his, up till Trevitt’s employment.

As for the EMC A/NZ channel business, it

has been managed by A/NZ general manager of service provider,

systems integrators and alliances, Mark Fioretto, and Brett

Harris was named A/NZ general manager, mid-market, inside

sales and distribution since Trevitt’s departure.

Trevitt was with EMC for about 10 years, starting out as a

commercial account manager (between 2005 and 2008) before

moving up the ranks and becoming A/NZ general manager of

channel sales.

Prior to being EMC A/NZ general manager of channel sales, a

role he was in for almost three years, he was its National Australia

Bank enterprise account director for a little over three years.

He also previously spent about seven years at IBM as its

account manager.

- HAFIZAH OSMAN

FRED VIET JOINS MICROSOFT

Microsoft has hired Fred Viet to head up its Surface commercial channel in A/NZ. Viet previously spent more than 11 years at Lenovo, most recently as its A/NZ channel director. He first started at Lenovo as a global account manager before taking on the role as a sales director for large accounts.

WAYNE ANDREWS STEPS DOWN FROM CSCComputer Sciences Corporation (CSC) chief financial officer and chief operating officer, Wayne Andrews, is stepping down from his position after more than three years with the company. Andrews is being replaced by CSC’s finance director in Asia, Stuart Adams, who will be relocating from Singapore to Australia to take on the role.

CAPGEMINI A/NZ APPOINTS NICOLAS AIDOUD AS CEOCapgemini has named Nicolas Aidoud as its A/NZ CEO. Aidoud succeeds Deepak Nangia, who will move to take on the role of chief customer officer for Asia-Pacific and the Middle East and assist the executive chairman in expanding Capgemini’s footprint in this region.

EMMA ROGERS LEAVES AWS FOR SERVICENOWServiceNow has named Emma Rogers as its Asia-Pacific and Japan

corporate communications director. Rogers joins ServiceNow from Amazon Web Services (AWS), where she held a number of roles – she was public relations manager for almost three years and Asia-Pacific analyst relations senior manager for more than two years.

PETER BRADY JOINS KASPERSKY LABKaspersky Lab has appointed Peter Brady as its new general manager. Brady replaces Andrew Mamonitis, who has since taken on a director role at distributor, Hemisphere Technologies. In this role, Brady will be responsible for developing Kaspersky Lab’s strategic business plan for the A/NZ region, and building partnerships.

COMMVAULT APPOINTS NEW VP FOR APJCommvault has appointed Owen Taraniuk as its new vice-president of APJ. In the new role, Taraniuk will be responsible for driving growth. Taraniuk has already launched a transformation program, which will see a realignment of the company’s sales functions and partner engagement model.

DROPBOX HIRES FIRST LOCAL AND ASIA CHANNEL CHIEFSDropbox has made two new executive appointments in A/NZ and Asia. Former channel and alliances manager at Infor, Greg Kieser, has been named head of partner sales A/

NZ at Dropbox and the company has chosen Marcus Low to be its head of channels in APJ. The two appointments will drive channel strategy and execution for each area of the company’s focus.

BULLETPROOF APPOINTS AAKASH GANDHI Bulletproof has hired Aakash Gandhi as its new general manager of business development and partners. In his newly created role, he will report to director of sales and marketing, Mark Randall, and will be responsible for leading Bulletproof’s sales team as well as dealing with the increasing demand for Cloud services.

GORDON GAKOVIC LEADS SOFTWARE AGSoftware AG has appointed Gordon Gakovic as managing director for its A/NZ operations. Based in Melbourne, Gakovic is responsible for managing and executing Software AG’s commercial initiatives and marketing strategies for the local market. Gakovic will also focus on strengthening and expanding the company’s footprint across the region.

MILNE TAKES ON UXC RED ROCK CEO POSTPhilip Milne has been named as the new CEO of UXC Red Rock. He takes on the post from Jonathan Rubinsztein, who left the company in January to join Infomedia (ASX:IFM) as its new global chief executive. Milne will be responsible for leading the team to grow the business.

IN BRIEF

VMware replaces John Donovan with Kerrie-Anne Turner

VMware has appointed Kerrie-Anne Turner

as its A/NZ head of channels and general

business. Turner’s first day in the office was

February 15.

She replaces John Donovan, who departed

the VMware A/NZ business in November last

year and joined ForgeRock as its new A/NZ

and ASEAN regional vice-president.

With a 25-year career in the information

technology sector, including 15 years

with software company Symantec, and

holding both global and regional senior

executive roles, Turner brings to VMware

a comprehensive management and

leadership skillset and the strong industry

experience required to help continue the

company’s current trajectory into 2016.

Before joining VMware, she held dual

roles of vice-president Asia-Pacific and managing director Australia

at StayinFront and was responsible for the company’s strategic

direction, its operational productivity and sales growth targets in the

Asia-Pacific region. She held these positions for more than six years.

Prior to that, Turner was the A/NZ managing director at

MessageLabs for more than a year. She was also an Asia-Pacific

advisory board member at the company.

- HAFIZAH OSMAN

EMC: 2005 –

JANUARY 2016

IBM: 1997 – 2004

CAREER

STAYINFRONT:

OCTOBER 2009 –

FEBRUARY 2016

MESSAGELABS:

AUGUST 2008 –

SEPTEMBER 2009

STAYINFRONT: JUNE

2007 – AUGUST 2008

SYMANTEC: 1995 –

MAY 2007

CAREER


12 NEWS/BORN IN THE CLOUD

The hot list

EmpiredRussell BaskervilleMANAGING DIRECTOR

NUMBER OF STAFF: more than 900

AGE OF COMPANY: 17 years

(was established in 1999 in Western

Australia, and listed on the ASX since 2007)

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: Empired’s core solution offerings

are in Cloud, enterprise mobility, big data,

and business analytics. These offerings

are delivered via three interactive business

streams: infrastructure and Cloud services;

consulting and application development; and

business and productivity solutions. Together

they provide extensive breadth of service

and expertise, and a range of services to

provide ‘end-to-end’ advice and solutions.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: We believe

we can leverage technology to deliver

tomorrow’s advantage today for our clients.

Dedication to this purpose, supported by

initiative, innovation, and growth, underpins

our value proposition and ability to deliver

high-quality business solutions. We

proudly boast a set of values and brand

commitments that define who we are

and what our stakeholders expect. These

have shaped an organisational personality

that we believe underpins exceptional

client experiences.

> FUTURE PLANS: We will invest in growth

and innovative services, with a clear focus

across the east coast of Australia. Our

investments will expand our capability in

data and IoT-related services and modern

applications, and leverage Cloud platforms.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: Put your people first, invest in innovation,

and evolve your services. Do this and our

industry, our clients, and all associated

stakeholders will enjoy great success.

BigAir GroupScott AtkinsonGROUP CLOUD AND

MANAGED SERVICES CTO

AGE OF COMPANY: 14 years

(is publicly listed on the ASX)

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: The BigAir Group is a national

business-focused ICT provider delivering

the latest Cloud-based solutions, managed

services, and network infrastructure.

We have our own national wireless

telecommunications network and

Cloud infrastructure.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: Our three

key pillars – network services, Cloud and

managed services, and campus solutions.

BigAir provides a wide range of network

services from its own national Fixed

Wireless network to more traditional cable

based solutions using fibre, dark fibre,

ethernet over copper and ADSL2. The BigAir

Cloud and Managed Services division is a

consultancy-based business that prides

itself on gathering customers’ business

environments and then delivering a fully

integrated solution. Our Cloud services

comprise both public and private as well

as hybrid options, and our technology

partnerships include only top-tier providers.

BigAir Campus Solutions provide

managed end-to-end high speed broadband,

networking, printing, billing systems and 24/7

operational support systems to the tertiary

student accommodation market. We’ve been

able to extend this experience seamlessly

into other campus style environments.

> FUTURE PLANS: We’ve been striving to

ensure that organisations deploy the right

type of network and technology, so they can

connect better than ever before. We began

by building and managing our fixed wireless

networks for business. We want to grow that

blanket coverage across the country.

We also have an end-to-end capability

and tools for mid-sized organisations to

free up their people and take the journey

towards more effective, efficient and

powerful ICT solutions.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: Adopt an agnostic approach to infrastructure

when designing the perfect configuration

for your clients’ networking requirements.

Hosted NetworkBen TownMANAGING DIRECTOR

NUMBER OF STAFF: 10

AGE OF COMPANY: Little over three years

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: We provide white label solutions

such as Desktop as a Service, Infrastructure

as a Service, Wholesale Internet, Backup

Put your people first, invest in innovation, and evolve your services. Russell Baskerville, Empired

This regular column looks at partners on the upward move. These are 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 asked five company leaders to file reports on their companies.


BORN IN THE CLOUD/NEWS 13

and disaster recovery, and VoIP to Managed

Service Providers across Australia.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: Hosted

Network is a 100 per cent channel focused

Cloud provider working directly with IT

integrators, software vendors and managed

service providers that are looking to make

a move into Cloud services. As part of our

relationship with them, we assist them with

their go-to-market strategy all the way

through to the sales and technical aspects

of their business.

> FUTURE PLANS: Our primary focus at the

moment is expanding our partner base

and building our training tools for our

partners to succeed with building their own

successful Cloud offerings.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: Look at diversifying your offerings. One of the

quickest and easiest ways to build revenue

is to sell additional services to your current

customers. Look what’s available in the

market and do your research on products and

services that will align with your business

model, and solve your customer’s pain points.

At Hosted Network, we encourage

partners to diversify and build their

product portfolio, allowing them to be in

a position to be the one-stop provider to

accommodate all of their customers’ IT

needs. By not limiting their service offering,

they are remaining competitive, opening

doors to increased revenue potential, and

strengthening their client “stickiness” and

retention opportunities.

VelpicRussell FrancisVELPIC CEO

NUMBER OF STAFF: 40, and growing

AGE OF COMPANY: Three years old in July

2016 (but the Velpic platform was formally

launched on July 1, 2014)

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: The Velpic platform is a SaaS

Cloud-based Learning Management

System (LMS) that allows anybody to create,

schedule, view and report on video lessons.

> BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: Velpic is

unique in the global LMS market place in

that it provides the user the ability to create

video based multimedia presentations

inside the Learning Management

System without having to use a separate,

complicated tool. It also allows the people

being trained to stream the video lessons

from the same platform. So our unique

selling point is that we have all the tools

anyone needs to create, schedule and

perform lessons and then report on the

results — all within the one extremely

simple to use browser-based application.

> FUTURE PLANS: Global expansion,

integration with other SaaS platforms,

maintaining first mover advantage.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: Launching Version 3.0 which has

been specifically designed to attract SME

customers by providing enhanced training

capabilities for SMEs — a rapidly growing

market segment of the broader Learning

Management Systems market. Version

3.0 will activate the third and final major

sales channel in Velpic’s three pillar sales

strategy, with pillar one being enterprise

sales and pillar two being the reseller

partnership channel, both already in place.

OlikkaRaphael BlanchetOLIKKA CLOUD LEAD

NUMBER OF STAFF: 25

AGE OF COMPANY: Five years

> PRODUCTS/SOLUTIONS IT BRINGS TO MARKET: What we do — Enterprise End

User Computing and Infrastructure; both

in the Cloud and on-premises. Why we do

it — Our focus is always on our customers

and what’s best for them, and we use our

specialised skills to ensure users have

a great experience on the platforms we

implement. We provide professional services

for design and implementation, and ongoing

as-a-service run, maintain, upgrade.

BUSINESS DIFFERENTIATOR: Olikka is

different. In fact, our name comes from the

Swedish word ‘olika’, which translates as

different, so being different is at our core

and has been since day one. We definitely

have a unique culture, and great people

who thrive in a high paced and flexible

environment, and we think that’s essential

in the Cloud era. Great people challenge

each other to think differently about what

enterprise organisations need, and this

translates to specific, crafted, modern,

non-cookie-cut solutions.

> FUTURE PLANS: From foundations in

systems management, automation and

virtualisation, Olikka has sharpened its focus

in the last two years to end user, Cloud, and

infrastructure. Being a dynamic, responsive

company, it is in our DNA to evolve, automate

and simplify whilst always retaining focus on

the end outcome for both the customer and

the end user. In such a connected, mobile

first world, Olikka sees a great future in the

Internet of Things, and our early projects in

the space are proving to be stimulating and

disruptive within our customer’s businesses.

> KEY MESSAGE TO THE CHANNEL IN 2016: We select our partners based on what we

believe is truly good for our customers

and we are continually assessing vendor’s

products and capabilities, and matching

these against our customer’s problems and

strategies. We enjoy talking to new vendors,

and when we do add a new vendor or

technology to our partnership list, we take

it seriously. Our message to all vendors

in the era of Cloud and consumption IT:

customers judge you on current execution,

not future plans.

“Our unique selling point is that we have all the tools anyone needs to create, schedule and perform lessons and then report on the results” Russell Francis, Velpic

“Customers judge you on current execution, not future plans” Raphael Blanchet, Olikka


14 THE EXPERTS/MSP

T here’s a

belief that

sales people

are coin-operated

(ie. they work

purely on extrinsic

rewards like their

pay packet). While

this may be true for

some, my experience is that the best sales

people are driven by intrinsic goals and

rewards (achieving results, recognition,

helping customers) with an understanding

that the money will follow.

Good compensation plans reward

success while enabling companies

to weed out non-performers. But,

equally, they should reward sales

people for doing the right thing.

There are countless stories of

compensation plans that had unintended

consequences from innovative sales

teams finding shortcuts.

Now, when the sales process is

established, the likelihood of that is

lessened. But when the business model

is untried or untested, the chances of

this are much higher.

Which is what I see in companies

transitioning to the Cloud but holding

onto old compensation plans. In fact, I am

aware of organisations where perpetual

license teams poached subscription

license clients (and convinced them to pay

a lump sum to own the software) in order

to achieve their targets.

So, in this instance, a compensation

plan should really be about rewarding

the behaviour that achieves results, not

the results themselves. Consider the five

different models shown in this article.

In the end, alignment is the key word.

Your reward system must align with the

behaviours you want, which must align with

your company goals. And if compensation

doesn’t change, nothing does.

Selling Cloud - change the sales compensationBy Moheb Moses

It can be difficult these days to come up with sensible reasons as to why businesses shouldn't embrace Cloud-based productivity tools such as Google for Work or Microsoft Office 365. The benefits of the Cloud are many and expanding. However, a number of common pitfalls for IT professionals exist and can have lasting negative implications on any organisation.

1 Cloud means lots of support for staff

Greg Meyers, corporate vice-president and CIO of Motorola Solutions, says the surest way for IT leaders to avoid the most common Cloud pitfalls is to learn from others' mistakes.

"The biggest mistake I've seen others make, and we've tried to avoid, was underestimating the change to employees and being unprepared to support them through the trauma that is changing the tools they have used daily for decades," Meyers said. "Be prepared to explain over and over why you're changing, stay committed to your principles, have empathy for those who won't be happy and provide overwhelming training, support and change management."

2 Limitations of Cloud's one-size-fits-all approach

Finding the right tools and applications that meet key business objectives and requirements is paramount to the success of a shift to the Cloud, according to Liz Herbert, a vice-president with Forrester Research.

"One of the biggest challenges I see is the one-size-fits nature of the Cloud," Herbert said. Simplicity and ubiquity drive many of the Cloud's obvious benefits, but the change can be a "huge challenge for CIOs" moving to environments that don't play favorites or tailor contracts to special interests.

3 Proactive planning for growth objectives

Companies can grow in new ways and improve business practices thanks to the Cloud, but these things don't happen on their own. IT leaders need to rethink how their businesses run and determine how assets - software, hardware and data - can be optimsed to drive business value, according to Matt Katzer, founder and president of the IT consulting firm, Kamind.

- MATT KAPKO

5 different models, 5 different objectives

100% commission

up front (eg. the

first month’s

income as

commission

with no residual

payments).

This is ideal for

new customer

acquisition, but can

create a culture

that is not oriented

to customer service

or retention.

100% commission

on consumption (ie.

paying commission

totally on a

recurring revenue

basis). This is

ideal for customer

retention and

growth, but over

time will mean that

sales people are

less likely to chase

new customers.

Mix with more up

front (ie. higher

percentage paid

as commission up

front, with smaller

percentage based

on the customers

recurring revenue).

Main emphasis

is on acquisition,

but also drives

retention.

Mix with less up

front (ie. lower

percentage up

front, with higher

percentage based

recurring revenue).

Some acquisition,

but focus in

predominantly

retention and

growth.

No commission

(ie. reps on a fixed

salary). This is

better for customer

retention,

although it can

also be applied to

acquisition. This

model reduces

“bad” behaviour,

but can be very

challenging to

manage.

3 common Cloud pitfalls IT leaders should avoid

MOHEB MOSES: is an ARN Hall of Fame inductee; CompTIA director, A/NZ channel community; and co-founder of

channel sales consulting and training firm, Channel Dynamics.

21 3 4 5


THOUGHT LEADERSHIP 15

M y favourite concept in management theory

is called the ‘Peter principle’. Named after

its author, a bloke called Laurence J. Peter,

it articulates a common feeling in the workplace:

“managers rise to the level of their incompetence.”

Ha! Rising to the level of their incompetence.

How wonderfully amusing, dark, insightful, cathartic,

and terrifying.

You know this story, right? The annual reviews tick

around and a hard-working employee is rewarded for

a job well done. Along comes the pay rise and more

responsibilities – they’re inseparable.

Well, Mr Peter discovered that’s not always the best

decision a leader can make. Your erstwhile colleague’s

past performance shouldn’t be the only reason why

they’re given a new role with greater responsibility.

Without the right training, or abilities, power goes to

their head, poor decisions are made, or people struggle

to follow the freshly empowered leader.

It’s a tough scenario because we’ve all been

there. That’s the “terrifying” aspect I referenced

earlier. Obviously the normal way to “get ahead” on

the corporate ladder is by demonstrating you’ve got

leadership and management potential.

MANAGING UPThe game we play is called ‘Managing Up’. We convince

our boss we’ve got the ability to think and act like them

and, if all goes well, the promotion is ours.

This linear thinking is insidious. We want to know

how to be a leader, a manager, a better person. Faced

with a new opportunity or stretch goal, we work hard

to overcome our secret perceived incompetence before

it’s no longer secret.

Think I’m exaggerating? Here’s the list of Inc.

Magazine’s Top 10 business books of 2015: Stand

Out, Team Genius, Team of Teams, Serial Winner,

You Win in the Locker Room First, People Over Profit,

Corporate Awesome Sauce, Do Over, Work Rules!,

and Steal The Show.

The trouble is nine out of 10 books are focused on

the incompetence dynamic – different variations of

“how to be a better leader” and “how to do a better job

at work”.

The only book that’s different. People Over Profit,

by Dale Partridge, is described by Inc. as: “A manifesto

and action plan for companies to remain socially

Forget how to be a great leader. Why are you a leader in the first place?By Mark Jones

MARK JONES is Chief

Storyteller + CEO at Filtered

Media, a brand storytelling

agency in Sydney.

responsible not because it's the right thing to do but

because it's the only way to survive.”

The subject matter sounds inspiring. But the

keyword in this description is manifesto – the author’s

attempt at articulating a higher calling.

Partridge appears to have looked past the obvious

obsession with “how” and gone for something far

more inspiring. Why are you a leader in the first place?

What’s your purpose? If you don’t have one he’s about

to give you one: a mission to transform profit-obsessed

corporations. It’s the principle that matters here.

This point was driven home by Michael Jr., one of

my favourite comedians. He told the story of a segment

in his act called “break time” where he chats with the

audience. Upon meeting a school music teacher, Michael

Jr. invites the man to sing Amazing Grace. What followed

was an understated, deep-register vocal rendition.

Sensing an opportunity to unlock something

amazing, Michael Jr. then asks the man, of African-

American descent, to sing the “’hood version”. Out

of nowhere came an entirely different performance.

The man picks it up a notch or three, jumps to a high

register, and his vocals soared all over the place like a

black gospel singer. Powerful stuff.

THE PUNCHLINEThe punchline here are words that apply equally to life

as they do leadership and team building.

“The first time I asked him to sing, he knew what

he was doing. The second time I asked him to sing, he

knew why he was doing it,” Michael Jr. said. “When you

know your why, your what has more impact, because

you’re walking in, or towards your purpose.”

It follows that the antidote for the Peter principle

is not more books about how to be a great leader, but

why you’re a leader at all. Get that right and the rest

will follow.

The antidote for the Peter principle is not more books

about how to be a great leader, but why you’re a leader at all


16 25 YEARS

How Tech Pacific was sold to IngramBy Mike Gee

The tale of how distie giant and market leader, Tech Pacific, was eventually sold in 2003, reads

like a chess game and ARN journalists (at the time) had fun following out.

Let’s start in on November 24, 2000, with a news flash from ARN’s Mark Jones: Tech Pacific embarks on Initial Public Offering (IPO) voyage.

Jones wrote, “[Netherlands-based parent company] Hagemeyer has revealed late it plans to either float or sell off Australia’s largest distributor. The Dutch company has engaged Salomon Smith Barney to explore the IPO or sale of Australia’s largest distributor.

“The move ends weeks of speculation about the Tech Pacific Group’s future after some sources in contact with ARN

suggested it was in due diligence to be acquired by another distributor, such as US-based Ingram Micro.

“Tech Pacific Group CEO, David Arnott, said the primary driver was to explore an IPO listing on a stock exchange, most likely in the Asia-Pacific region, and possibly the ASX.

“He said Hagemeyer is not attempting to sell the Tech Pacific Group, but concedes anything is possible.”

FOUR MONTHS LATERThere was more huffing and puffing on March 28, 2001, with a story by Anthony Doesburg, about Tech Pacific NZ’s sale to Ingram mooted.

Doesburg reported: “The Asia-Pacific head of $US30 billion

distributor Ingram Micro, Hans Koppen, doesn’t rule out buying Tech Pacific NZ, although it’s not clear whether Tech Pacific is for sale.”

“Tech Pacific is ‘in a little limbo’, according to Koppen, since Hagemeyer said in November that it is considering selling or taking the IT distribution business public.”

SIX MONTHS LATEROn August 29, 2001, ARN’s Brett Winterford reported that the Tech Pacific sale was on hold and that and the proposed sale of the distribution giant had been cancelled.

He wrote, “Hagemeyer stated market conditions were not conducive to earning what it considers to be a suitable price.

“The group decided it was in the best interest of shareholders to keep Tech Pacific as part of its portfolio.

“With the current uncertainty affecting the ICT industry worldwide, it has become clear that extending the divestment process further would not maximise shareholder value.”

“Recently we came to the conclusion that given the present state of the IT market and the Australian economy, we can’t get a sales price that reflects the value of Tech Pacific. We can’t get what it’s worth, so we won’t sell,” said Hagemeyer CEO, Rob ter Haar.

“Hagemeyer will look at selling Tech Pacific again when the economic tide has turned, said chief financial officer, James Riddell. “As the cycle recovers,

APRIL 2001 Much to the bewilderment of smaller resellers, Tech Pacific announced it would charge resellers $33 for orders under $1000. Those placed on the TP website would incur a $22 fee.

MAY 2001 Toshiba’s former distributor, CHA, is forced into receiveship by ANZ bankers. Ingram Micro is appointed national distie alonside Tech Pacific and Dicker Data.

JULY 2001 After his short-term contract expired, Siltek Asia-Pacific CEO, Bruce Harvey, high-tailed it out of the country. This left the distributor’s Australian operations without a figurehead.

AUGUST 2001 After a short stint in the Australian market and an even shorter stint running a channel program, Gateway closed up shop - 200 people lost their jobs as a result.

SEPTEMBER 2001 HP and Compaq shocked the IT world with a planned merger. HP would acquite its arch-rival for $US25bn in the largest deal since Compaq acquired Digital in 1998.

OCTOBER 2001 Microsoft launched its new operating system, Windows XP, with fashion models, hot air balloons and helicopters.

JANUARY 2002 After flip-flopping several times, Tech Pacific finally abolished its $33 ($22 online) for orders under the set minimum of $250.

MARCH 2002 XBox mania hit retailers as consoles and games flew off the shelves to the delight of retailers. Larger retail chains got the gig: Myer, Grace Bros, Kmart, Target, Big W, Toys ‘R’ Us and Electronics Boutique.

Cisco produced plans to bypass distributors and sell to its Gold partners.

JULY 2002 IT services company, Commander, acquired leading HP reseller, Centari Systems, for an initial payment of $16 million.

AUGUST 2002 Powerlan exited the reseller business following Theo Baker’s shock decision to wind up the old Powerlan Queensland business and place it in voluntary administration.

Timeline 2001-2003

On March 31, 2005, the Tech Pacific name disappeared with the completion of the merger

of Tech Pacific’s business into Ingram Micro throughout Asia.


18 25 YEARS

OCTOBER 2002Volante landed a record $12 million managed services deal with oil and gas company company, Santos.

DECEMBER

2002

Data#3 took a hit of about $2 million to soothe creditors and customers of the disastrous Queensland Software Services (QSS) joint venture.

FEBRUARY

2003

Ingram Micro global CEO, Hans Kopper, declared the company would knock Tech Pacifc of its Australian distribution throne within three years.

MARCH 2003 Intel officially launched Centrino.

APRIL 2003 Cisco bought Linksys.

MAY 2003

Harvey Norman launched its first concept retail store in Chatswood, Sydney, featuring digital cameras, notebooks, PDAs, mobile phones, entertainment consoldes, games and accessories.

JULY 2003Cellnet acquired Queensland-based components wholesaler, Cassa Australia, for $1.47m and assumed $2.31m in debt.

AUGUST 2003

Local components and peripherals distributors BBF and Bluechip Infotech announced a share-swap merger, effective January 1, 2004.

OCTOBER 2003

Following a six-week distribution review, Cisco dropped Tech Pacific in favour of retaining value-added relationships with Express Data and LAN Systems.

HP realigned its distribution landscape, adding Avnet Partner Solutions while ditching Digiland and eXeed.

DECEMBER

2003

Management at Sydney-based distributor, Alstom IT, made an offer to its US parent to buy out the local distribution arm.

then sure in the long-term we’ll look at divesting Tech Pacific,” said Riddell.

NEARLY 14 MONTHS LATERCome October 17, 2002, and ARN’s Gerard Norsa reported in a story that Tech Pacific is no longer for sale. “Just over 12 months ago, Tech Pacific was for sale to the highest bidder. When a buyer could not be found, the sale went on hold. Now there are no plans at all for Australia’s largest distributor to change hands.

“Kerry Baillie, Tech Pacific’s local managing director, claims that the sale of Tech Pacific is not just on hold, it is off the agenda altogether.

“‘None whatsoever,’ was Baillie’s response to the question of whether there were still any plans for Hagemeyer to sell Tech Pacific. ‘It would not be on my agenda even if it was still for sale, but I have actually asked that question [of Hagemeyer] and was told a definite ‘no’.’

“Nor is there any consideration from the company’s Dutch owners to attempt to grow its own local market share and revenues through acquisition.”

EIGHT MONTHS LATERHowever, that state of affairs didn’t last long. On June 15, 2003, Anthony Doesburg reported, “Tech Pacific changes hands”.

“Hagemeyer, has sold a 58.5 per cent stake to investment company

CVC. Hagemeyer is holding on to 31.5 per cent while the remaining 10 per cent has been sold to Tech Pacific management,” he wrote.

“New Zealand managing director, Tony Butler, says CVC expressed interest when Tech Pacific was put up for sale in late 2000. But an agreement couldn’t be reached, and Tech Pacific was eventually withdrawn from the market.

ANOTHER FIFTEEN MONTHS LATERFinally, on September 27, 2004, ARN’s Brian Corrigan reported: Ingram Micro buys Tech Pacific for $700 million.

“Ingram Micro Inc. has bought Tech Pacific Holdings in a deal estimated at $700 million. The announcement will see Ingram significantly strengthen its IT distribution arm in Asia-Pacific, a move which had been highlighted as a company priority. The deal is expected to be finalised by the end of the year”, he wrote.

“The news follows ongoing speculation that Tech Pacific would issue an IPO on the ASX if it was unable to negotiate a trade sale. CVC had owned a 58.5 per cent share in Tech Pacific and Hagemeyer a further 31.5 per cent. The remaining 10 per cent was split between senior management.”

On March 31, 2005, the Tech Pacific name disappeared with the completion of the merger of Tech Pacific’s business into Ingram Micro throughout Asia.

And so a signficant chapter in Australian ICT industry finally came to an end.

Tech Pacific managing director, Kerry Baillie,

carries the 2004 Olympic Games torch through

the streets of Sydney.

Blow-by-blow

24.10.2000

Tech Pacific

embarks on

IPO voyage

28.03.2001

Tech Pacific NZ

sale to Ingram

mooted

29.08.2001

Tech Pacific sale

on hold

17.10.2002

Tech Pacific is no

longer for sale

15.06.2003

Tech Pacific

changes hands

27.09.2004

Ingram Micro buys

Tech Pacific for

$700 million

Timeline (continued)


20 INTERVIEW/IBM

She is a successful professional: a determined and driven unmistakable talent. But even she will admit to sometimes suffering from “impostor syndrome” and thinking she had to dress more masculine in order to impress with the “power pantsuit.” IBM A/NZ director of global business partners, Rhody Burton, sat

down with ARN in a very candid and personal discussion about her journey into IT, lessons learned along the way, and some personal insights and even unknown facts.

Associate Editor, JENNIFER O’BRIEN, reports.

Change agent leads IBM’s channel transformation


IBM/INTERVIEW 21

Rhody Burton doesn’t mix her words when she starts talking about women working in

IT and how to battle confidence and self-esteem issues. “With impostor syndrome, you are waiting for someone to tap you on the shoulder and say, ‘what are you doing here? How did you get this job? Someone more capable is going to come in and take over.’ I definitely, throughout my career, deal with impostor syndrome,” she said, also explaining how wearing the “power suit” was one way to conform.

“I thought that was the uniform in order to be successful. The people who I saw as successful wore business suits so I started emulating that,” she said, but things changed once she got involved with running the diversity council at VMware.

“It was at that point that I recognised here I am, getting dressed every day to look like the man and to have my power suits and the cufflinks and all of the rest of it and, in fact, what is valuable about me is that I am not like them. And it was this ‘ah ha’ moment telling me to be authentic. The realisation gave me permission to be me.”

Manly-born and raised Burton - who has close to 20 years experience in the channel, having worked at Seagate Software, Business Objects, Crystal Decisions, VMware A/NZ and SAP Australia and is also a WIICTA 2012 Rising Star winner - credits her single mum’s hard-working nature and dedication to family for her strong work ethic.

“At one stage, mum had three jobs to provide for my sister and me. But we never knew it. I never looked back at that time and thought we are poor, we don’t have the money. I honestly believe that my work ethic and the fact that we have to work the hours we have to work, and we have to juggle

motherhood within those hours, everything that goes along with that, that was normal to me.

“I got home from school and my mum wasn’t there. She was at her second job, trying to earn enough money so that I didn’t know she was struggling to pay for school shoes. I am so incredibly close with my mum. She would definitely be my inspiration for that work ethic side of things.”

Burton never saw her gender as a hindrance in terms of career

development. If anything, she said she has been incredibly lucky with the managers and leaders that she’s been exposed to, and the sponsors and mentors she’s met along the way.

“I have never found that being a female has hindered my career at all. I’ve been a little bit oblivious to it and it wasn’t until I started running the diversity council that I realised a number of things. One of which is just how many women don’t get that opportunity, so I want to give back and help them,” she said.

“I’m so passionate about supporting things like women in IT and I’m also incredibly passionate about trying to encourage youth, male or female, to choose our industry to work in. I just naturally had people looking out for me throughout my career and so I have to give back.”

So how did Burton get into IT? Was it something she always envisioned?

“Absolutely not,” she said, explaining she wanted to be a lawyer or a writer, but “never in IT”.

“This is probably something people may not realise: I actually left school in Year 10. I left school early primarily because I wanted to earn money. I was very driven to earn money. A lot of my friends were older than me. They had left school, they started getting jobs. A few of them were temping and I remember thinking they were earning a lot of money and I wanted that. So I made

Mum put me through secretarial school and I went out and I started temping.”

At 18, she left for the UK with a friend and immersed herself in the world of temping, during which she landed a role at an IT company, dubbed The Point Group.

“It was in the channel funnily enough. We were the middle man for the hardware vendors and software vendors. I was hired to be the office administrator for Angus Panton. He was this amazing guy, an entrepreneurial person who needed help. He started to realise that I pick things up easily. He was so slammed with managing this business that he started giving me more and more things to do. I left school early, didn’t have any experience in IT whatsoever and within the first six months I had two clients.”

When Burton, after three years in the UK, returned to Australia, she

MAY 1997 - DECEMBER

1998:

Partner relations, Seagate Software

DECEMBER 1998 -

DECEMBER 1999:

VAR partner manager - Seagate Software

DECEMBER 1999 -

FEBRUARY 2001:

Distribution manager A/

NZ - Seagate Software

FEBRUARY 2001 - JULY

2004:

Channel and inside sales

manager - Crystal Decisions

JULY 2004 - APRIL 2006:

A/NZ channel manager - Business Objects

JANUARY 2007 - DECEMBER

2010:

Senior partner business

manager - VMware

MAY 2010 - DECEMBER

2010:

Acting director, channels A/NZ -

VMware

DECEMBER 2010 - JULY

2013:

Manager, Cloud and Channels A/

NZ - VMware

JULY 2013 - SEPTEMBER

2015:

Sales director, channels - SAP

SEPTEMBER 2015 -

PRESENT:

Director of global business

partners, A/NZ - IBM

CAREER TIMELINE

”We are a new IBM. We are not a software, hardware and services company anymore. We are a cognitive solution company where the platform is Cloud and we go to market by industry”

On IBM


22 INTERVIEW/IBM

began temping again, and given her positive experience in the channel was adamant she wanted to work in IT. “There were lots of great jobs in advertising that other women wanted. But I said I would hold out for one in IT, so just give me short term assignments. If you spoke to mum or my family or friends, they will tell you I’m quite determined. I had decided IT was the industry for me and I couldn’t be swayed.” She got her foot in the door at Seagate Software as partner relations and the rest is history.

LIFE LESSONS But perhaps one of Burton’s biggest life lessons was an incident that happened in childhood, which she credits for helping her foster her relationship building skills and developing a sense of courage.

“When I was 11, quite a life changing thing happened to me. I fell off a cliff at Freshwater Beach. It was the first time I had really been hit with a big challenge. It was about three-and-a-half metres down and I landed on rock so I was in hospital for ages. I had a lot of time off school. I know I had gone from being at this little public school where everybody knew everybody to suddenly having the first three to six months out in Year 6. It was really a big deal,” she said.

“I broke both of my wrists, my jaw in two places. I shattered my kneecap. I was on the news and in the papers. When you were 11 that was kind of cool. I do remember coming back to school that year and there were new kids who had come in. I was almost like the new kid for the first time. I remember having to build relationships.”

Certainly, this ability to build

relationships has landed her in good stead. It has also given her momentum to take on new positions at a number of different technology companies.

CAREER JOLTS ALONG THE WAY From channel and inside sales manager, channel manager, channel sales director, acting channel director, Cloud and channels manager, senior partner business manager, and now director of global business partners, Burton has amassed a breadth of experience.

She said one of her biggest hurdles was moving from VMware to SAP. “It was a big, big culture shock. Being a channel person, I don’t think I quite appreciated just what a mature channel organisation VMware is. And I had always worked for fast growing companies that are in a good space. The culture is very much, ‘Yes, let’s do this. Wow, that’s a great idea. Let’s try that.’ And so I had come out of these environments of enjoying what I do and passionate about what I do. I happened to be very lucky to work for companies on this growth trajectory,” she said.

“Suddenly, I was working for this successful, established 40-year-old organisation that is very process driven and the answer isn’t always ‘yes’ because it is running a much bigger business and everyone has a great idea. I loved my time at SAP. It is full of really really talented people.”

It also prepared Burton for her current position at IBM. “It was the best preparation for coming into IBM. And now I’m at an 104-year-old company. I have gone from those young ones to older ones. I learned so much in those

two years at SAP. It prepared me for being a better leader and better at stakeholder management.”

CHARTING HER NEXT COURSEFast forward to today, and her journey at IBM is an exciting time for Burton, even though she says Big Blue wasn’t initially on her job wish list.

“IBM wasn’t on a list of companies that I aspired to want to go and work for. Probably my perception of IBM was that it was a big, old, blue suits company and if you look at the press and read what some of the analysts are saying overall about the company, it just wasn’t on my radar of companies that I wanted to go to. And I did not feel that my time at SAP was done.”

But she is thankful her path has led her to IBM, a journey that has already activated the change agent in her.

“IBM has transformed itself many times over the years; in fact, we are one of the longest standing companies in this industry,” she said. “This is an opportunity for me to be part of something really special. This is an opportunity for me to be part of a change and a transformation and a point in time for this company that is really taking us into that new era.”

She said IBM is well placed to take the transformative journey given the company’s breadth of solutions and capabilities. “What a great opportunity to come in and help be part of that core team that educates everyone on what it is that IBM is today. We are a new IBM. We are not a software, hardware and services company anymore. We are a cognitive solution company where the platform is Cloud and we go to market by industry. That is what IBM is today and I want to be part of the team of people that is helping not only our customers see that and even get them to do things in a new way, but the channel,” she said.

Burton is passionate about helping current partners become more sticky, build managed services, add differentiators into what they do, as well as attract new partners. “I would love the message in the marketplace to be: ‘wow, I didn’t know IBM did that. I need to go and talk to them.’ My vision is we are going to have more and more partners wanting to come and talk to us about including IBM in what they do.”

Her visionMy vision for the role and the team is I want

to be recognised as the vendor of choice, not

only for the traditional IT channel. There are

a lot of traditional IT organisations trying to

transform themselves and I want to be able

to let them know just the breadth of not only

solutions, but people within my organisation

who can help them on that journey and that

trajectory. I am also really interested in,

‘What are the new channels of tomorrow?

What does the new partner look like?’


24 ROUNDTABLE/DATACENTRE

EMC and VCE opened up the Buy vs. Build debate alongside key distributor partners and resellers at an exclusive ARN Roundtable at Rockpool Bar & Grill in Sydney. Attendees discussed the changing dynamics of the datacentre, the market opportunities for the channel and from a local perspective, the emerging business use cases. ARN Editor, JAMES HENDERSON, reports.

Buy vs. Build?The changing dynamics of the datacentre

This roundtable was sponsored by EMC


DATACENTRE/ROUNDTABLE 25

“Let’s move away from this absolute nature of the Cloud, and explore a fit for purpose approach in the market,” VCE/EMC chief technology officer of Converged Platforms, Matthew Oostveen, said.

As the changing dynamics of the datacentre play out through the local market - and disruptive factors change the course of IT transformation - Oostveen’s message to the Australian channel is straightforward in delivery, and resounding in its reach.

“Not every workload or application is best suited to the Cloud, and the Australian enterprise landscape is changing to reflect this,” Oostveen said, in addressing a host of key partners and distributors during the exclusive ARN Roundtable Lunch, Buy vs. Build? The changing dynamics of the datacentre.

In citing a move away from an all-out Cloud approach to business, he said the datacentre of today is under bombardment from a host of disruptive technologies, such as the Internet of Things, Big Data and software-defined infrastructure.

Combining to foster a hybrid Cloud environment, businesses across the country are seeking alternative ways to support growing demands for new applications and services, while juggling limited budgets and resources.

In Australia, and overseas, it’s playing out in the numbers with more than 80 percent of enterprise IT organisations expected to commit to hybrid Cloud architectures by the end of 2017, according to IDC research.

Naturally, Cloud computing continues to gain momentum locally, but as the industry evolves, IT organisations continue to standardise on converged infrastructure as the foundation for next generation datacentres, with complexity and cost reduction coming to the fore.

“From a partner perspective,” Tecala Group managing director, Pieter DeGunst, says, “we’re having many fit for purpose conversations.”

Speaking as an EMC partner of over 10 years in Australia, DeGunst acknowledges that as new technologies continue to impact the datacentre, fit for purpose becomes a “wide ranging conversation”, offering no one size fits all approach for the channel.

“This is where we’re engaging with our customers, through a consultative process,” he adds.

Echoing DeGunst’s analysis of the current datacentre state of play, Nexus IT managing director, Sean Murphy, said there is “no cookie cutter” approach to developing a hybrid Cloud model, as hyper converged takes a top seat at the table of Australian boardrooms.

“Two years ago, a CIO would read a technology magazine and say they want to be in the Cloud, and we’d build a business case around that,” he recalls.

“We can put anyone 100 per cent in the Cloud or on-premise, or provide a combination of both, but it takes time for that customer to figure this out and work through the complicating factors.”

Through blending on-premise and Cloud environments, Oriel Technologies chief technology officer, Richard Mitton, said the coexistence of both has derived from a reversal in conversation, with the adage of “doing more with less” prompting partners to find real-time solutions to changing business demands.

For Mitton, businesses now explore running workloads on-premise, retracting on a previous all out approach to Cloud.

“But we’re just the IT plumbers,” he said. “Businesses essentially want to keep running in the same way so the changing market is disruptive for the plumbers in the respect of Cloud migration.”

Guests:Ben Le Huray INGRAM MICRO

Matt Oostveen VCE/EMC

Adrian Chu AVNET

Cam Wayland CHANNEL DYNAMICS

Richard Centellas VCE

Darren Ashley BEARENA

Alex Kennedy DATACOM

Sean Murphy NEXUS IT

Richard Mitton ORIEL TECHNOLOGIES

PieterDeGunst TECALA

Moderators:James Henderson Jennifer O’Brien

Photos: Maria Stefina

CORE 1:Value and solutions

“Through our EMC architects we actively engage

with partners to educate the channel on the vendor

portfolio and new products coming to market.

Resellers old and new must understand the value

they bring to the table and how to deliver solutions

to the end user market.”

– Ingram Micro’s Ben LeHuray



Milton observed, “Customer businesses don’t change as fast as we want to change the IT plumbing”, indicative of the varying degree of maturity levels across the Australian enterprise.

“Cloud means different things to different organisations,” adds Datacom national Cloud manager, Alex Kennedy. “As a partner our role is to assess where each customer sits in terms of Cloud adoption, and the level of maturity they have.”

In adopting a hyper converged approach to the market for the past three years, BEarena managing director, Darren Ashley, said CIOs of today require differing Cloud strategies, yet crucially for partners, “always repeat what they’ve done before.”

“There is a pattern to follow,” he said. “But it remains an education play given the rapid pace of technology today.

“Our goal is to make the infrastructure invisible and the next stage is to assess the Cloud goals of the CIO, which shifts the focus onto which

workloads should stay on-premise, and which should move to the Cloud.”

WORKLOADSWhether it’s considered a blessing or a curse, CIOs today have a multitude of options when it comes to running workloads, creating complexity for partners around which applications should reside where within an IT architecture.

“And that’s the key question,” VCE/EMC’s Matt Oostveen observed. “Pragmatic CIOs understand that some workloads will be kept in house and that others are suited to the Cloud.”

But as Oostveen explained, the question of how partners can provide business leaders with a homogenised view of workloads and management capabilities remains.

“We’re trying to bridge the chasm between the two and this is where the conversation lies for CIOs,” he said.

VCE senior director of vArchitects, Ricardo Centellas, reinforced the fact that CIOs of today want to understand how partners can close the gap between workloads, as the conversation shifts to business use cases and experiences.

“Of the CIOs I meet, they want to know about managing and orchestrating workloads, as well as the provision and integration aspects of hyper converged technology,” he said.

PERCEPTION VS. REALITYAkin to the ongoing industry dilemma of ‘to Cloud or not to Cloud?’ the continuous enhancement of IT has been both a boon and a burden for channel partners.

In drawing on previous market experience, Murphy observes that as the dynamics of the datacentre change, the role of the partner transforms in parallel, as “cloudify” application trends trigger new industry challenges.

“Most workloads aren’t public Cloud ready and are built on a system that’s 25 years old,” he said. “But the solution to this problem comes in at a budget of $500,000, placing the onus on the partner to intelligently and creatively provide an alternative outcome.”

Centellas, in referring to the value-add of seasoned channel partners in Australia, believes such market behaviour represents an opportunity for resellers to former deeper engagements with customers, through establishing a business starting point.

“Partners are critical to EMC and we understand that on occasions customers want $5 million worth of technology and expertise for $500,000,” he acknowledged.

“But here lies an opportunity. Customers think they understand the business criteria and needs of applications but they don’t know the smarts or possess the IP and background that partners have.

“As such, there’s a chance for partners to open the dialogue with customers and make trade-offs to ensure a mutually beneficial outcome.”

BUY VS. BUILDOnce committing to a hybrid Cloud model, reflecting the current approach for Australian businesses, organisations must now decide whether to buy or build.

Prompted by EMC’s newly released hyper-converged appliance VxRail, the question returns to the boardroom amidst a changing datacentre outlook.

While the build path may appear to be limitless in its customisation options,

CORE 2:Workloads

“Pragmatic CIOs understand that some

workloads will be kept in house and that others

are suited to the Cloud.”

– VCE/EMC’s Matt Oostveen



Buy vs. Build - top 5 channel opportunities

1 Bearena managing director, Darren

Ashley: During the past six months, we’re seeing numerous instances of customers being secured by Cloud reps. But with through hyper converged, the direction of travel is clear across Australia - businesses are fully embracing hybrid Cloud. Conversations of the past used to be all Cloud, now they are more focused around hybrid solutions.

2 Oriel Technologies chief technology

officer, Richard Mitton: We’re now becoming the customer with regards to hyper converged and this begs the question; do I buy or do I build? This is the conversation I’m having everyday with vendors, focused around how we partner together so we’re joining forces going forward. The channel used to come through us, but now it stops with us. It’s a new

conversation and some vendors get it but a lot don’t. Change will need to happen because this is how our customers want to buy. They stopped talking speeds and feeds three years ago, and the focus has shifted to business outcomes and solving problems.

3 Nexus IT managing director, Sean

Murphy: For the organisations that don’t want to pay for the resources of partners, they sweet spot for the market is the hyper converged play. It allows partners to provide a solution that has the backing of a globally trusted vendor with a guarantee to work and meet its SLA requirements.

4 Datacom national Cloud manager, Alex

Kennedy: I’m the new buyer for vendors. The industry is being disrupted by public Cloud and the key for partners is to become

more effective to their customers. Hyper converged is a way to disrupt public Cloud providers and offer new services that may not be in the market today.

5 Tecala managing director, Pieter

DeGunst: If I look at each individual conversation, approaching it from an educational standpoint, what are we trying to achieve? It’s about having the diligence and the patience to bring the conversation back to the outcome you’re trying to achieve. Let’s not skip the technology aspect but we’ll get to that later. Do you want to buy or build? Again, let’s have that talk further down the line. The main focus centres around having a fit for purpose conversation with customers, and ensuring our staff are having multi-level service engagements because this is where we are generating the most success.

through building their own hybrid Cloud solution.

“Providing CIOs with the correct infrastructure frees up resources and staff to focus on other aspects of the business.

“It allows organisations to look upwards and recognise growth opportunities, but they can’t undertake this radical shift without both the vendor and partner providing the correct tools to achieve this.”

With the DIY approach to IT a dying game, opening the door for partners to both add and extract value from strategic hyper-converged infrastructure plays continues to gain greater relevance across the channel.

“But for resellers, it’s hard to qualify a clear differentiator between buy vs. build,” cautions Ingram Micro solutions architect team leader, Ben Le Huray. “As such, partners are reverting back to a per user and per business case approach.”

Taking the distributor conversation further, Avnet Technology Solutions business unit director, Adrian Chu, said top tiering partners throughout Australia possess a “strong grasp on reality”, with complexity and hardship trickling down to the mid to lower tier of partners.

“Through the lower end of our partner base, we’re guiding them through the process at a deeper level, articulating and presenting the value

it’s a journey that presents significant challenges for already overextended IT staff resources.

For the process of continually evaluating, integrating, managing and sustaining hardware and software solutions is both costly and ties up valuable resource.

Traditionally, the alternative, buying an IT converged solution, has been the privilege of companies with sizeable budgets

Irrespective of sector or size however, Oostveen believes momentum

in the IT market has shifted.Recent technological developments

now ensure partners can put businesses, of all sizes, on the path to eliminating complexity and extracting value from hyper converged infrastructure solutions.

“I don’t think this needs to be a complicated message for the channel to articulate,” Oostveen said.

“Businesses don’t know what they don’t know and at present, they don’t know that they are tying up expensive resources and skill sets



of the changing datacentre market,” Chu said.

“Lots of partners from the old days are servicing one or two key clients - which has been their core business - but now the opportunity has arrived to evolve and adapt. The converged play is upon them whether they are ready or not, and they need to get on board.”

As more businesses embrace hybrid Cloud services, partners that continue offering traditional IT services run the risk of competitors with more efficient, nimble business models capturing customers and market share.

“At Datacom, we’re constantly evaluating how we can provide additional value in respect of the changing converged infrastructure market,” Kennedy added.

“We’re seeing a shift in customers hiring architects, moving to the public Cloud with some workloads still on-premise. But they don’t realise that the architect will stay to build the solution, hang around for a while and eventually move onto the next thing.”

Kennedy advised that six months after the architect’s departure, customers are left contemplating how to run a changing and convoluted environment.

“They thought it was a piece of gold but it turned out to be a lemon,” he

said. “Our role as partners is to educate enterprise on how the management of processes during change and the fit for purpose approach required to go to market.”

RESELLER ENABLEMENTWith the hyper converged play focused on the end game, defining an outcome that best fits the needs of the customers remains mission critical.

To extract value in this context, Channel Dynamics director, Cam Wayland, said partners should utilise support from all aspects of the channel, focusing on enabling staff to better address business concerns during the sales process, to avoid a race to the bottom on pricing.

“Hyper converged is a great story within the industry, but it’s what hyper converged can deliver and the business outcomes it provides that is the key conversation to have for partners. And that’s the play, educating sales staff to

drive business conversations rather than product pitches.”

In capturing the partner skill set within the Australian channel, Wayland believes business and financial focused training provides the deepest value for resellers continually tasked with taking new technologies to market.

“The technology is good but the business skills training and value-add messaging around how a partner builds their own IP is what’s important,” he said.

“If this issue isn’t addressed, partners end up in a discounted scenario because they haven’t properly articulated their value proposition

from the outset, and because of this, they become drawn into a conversation about price.”

At Ingram Micro, Le Huray said the role of the distributor in this equation evolves around enabling partners to put in the “hard yards” of backend work required to offer differentiation in an increasingly competitive world.

A refreshed approach to selling key to hyper converged success

With partner ecosystems in a state of flux, and partners required to adapt to shrinking margins, new competition and ongoing skills shortages, the resellers winning the hyper converged war are those investing in long-term sales training.

As outlined by BEarena’s Darren Ashley, successful partners are finding ways to better equip staff to delve deeper into the datacentre conversation, banishing a previous reliance on traditional speeds and feeds methods.

“What we’ve focused heavily on is positioning our solutions and steering the conversations with customers,” he explains. “Three years ago the

conversations were always the same, focused around the speed of disks and the specs of the product.

“I can’t remember the last time I had this conversation with customers because today, the discussion has developed to focus on the business outcomes.

“One of my sales personnel went through the entire sales process with a customer, but returned to ask for more discount because the hyper converged offering was more expensive than the competition.

“We sat down and talked it over and I asked, “Where do you think you failed?”

For Ashley, if a sales person arrives at the end of a process and the customer

is still making a judgment based on price, then the partner has failed.

“It means we haven’t done a good job of explaining hyper converged and the key business benefits of the customer,” he explains. “We’ve put our name to hyper converged and undertaken lots of sales training internally as a result.

“The easy way is hard and the hard way is easy. If partners put in the hard work up front, and follow these steps then when the sales process arrives, they’ll cut through it without hesitation or difficulty.

“But for those partners keen to take the easy route there’s a misplaced assumption that at the end of the sales process, the customer will

automatically choose your solution.” Going forward, Ashley believes

partners operating within the hyper converged systems space must evaluate different sales approaches, technology options, potential use cases, in keeping with providing related services to customers.

“We have a lot of journeymen still within the industry, those who have been working in the channel of 30 years and find it impossible to change their mindset around how they sell.

“I’m seeing a huge difference in approach from our younger staff coming through, they are our top performing sales reps because of this refreshed mindset.”

CORE 3:Selling changes

“We recognise that the old relationships

required to sell are dying and that the

challenger sale is the new breed”

- Adrian Chu, Avnet



“Through our EMC architects we actively engage with partners to educate the channel on the vendor portfolio and new products coming to market,” he said. “Resellers old and new must understand the value they bring to the table and how to deliver solutions to the end user market.”

It’s a testament mirrored by Chu, with Avnet providing both technical and sales paths to foster a challenger methodology to sales, empowering partners to take control of the sales conversation.

“We recognise that the old relationships required to sell are dying and that the challenger sale is the new breed,” he said. “We’re ensuring our partners clearly define opportunities within the market and educating the channel on new methods rather than traditional approaches to sales.”

As Kennedy explained, the art of understanding what the customer is trying to achieve within a hyper converged environment can be fraught with complexity, citing strong sales staff at those widening the conversation across different areas of the business.

“Sales people can traditionally be very product focused and while a few may succeed, this isn’t the required approach,” he said. “We talk to customers at different levels to ensure our finger is on the pulse in terms of identifying ongoing pain points and challenges.

Rise of hyper converged triggers changing channel dynamic

As hyper converged architecture injects new life into a stagnant IT infrastructure, sales opportunities are emerging for channel partners.

But with opportunity comes challenge, with resellers traditionally tasked with overcoming costing barriers as revenue streams come under duress.

“There’s disruption in the market and as a company, we’ve become both the provider and the customer,” adds Oriel’s Richard Mitton.

“On the topic of buy vs. build, is there a cost to my organisation as a partner? When the disruption eases, where will the dust settle within the channel?”

For partners, Mitton believes the question moves away from technology, touching on the commercial aspects of hyper converged and how the channel extracts value from the vendor.

“I’m now the customer so I need to benefit and make this a mutually beneficial venture,” he adds.

In recognising the changing position of the partner within the market, VCE’s Ricardo Centellas said vendors must now take credible steps to ensure support is extended across the channel.

“We often have that talk with partners and when the service provider is the customer, EMC comes in to review cost models and help rework strategies going forward. We want partners to talk to us about how they can inject value into our offerings,” he said.

“If the conversation is dominated by dollars and cents, then maybe that isn’t the conversation to be having.

“Partners must understand that customers want to know how to move the business from point A to point B.”

While the goal has always been for vendors to better engage with partners, and assist from a sales perspective, Wayland believes the harsh reality and fluctuating market conditions hinder the ability to tighten the lines of communications through the channel.

“The concept of alignment is crucial,” he advised. “That’s the order check for a high performing channel, are vendors, distributors and partners aligned in terms of training, sales meshing, skills and supply chains - if they line up, it bodes for a healthy channel.”

To facilitate this change of approach throughout the channel, Oostveen recognises that generally speaking, “vendors must be easier to do business with” for partners.

Substantially altering the vendor and partner relationship in the process, Oostveen said from an EMC perspective, there is changing realisation that vendors must find better ways to communicate through its complex ecosystem of partners.

“We need to provide our partner community with the right type of

access to the right type of people at the right time, and this is crucial to our ongoing growth within the market,” he said.

In closing, Oostveen said the “immediate opportunity” for partners lies around “fit for purpose”, through bridging and binding together the workload and infrastructure conversation.

As the changing dynamics of the datacentre play out at a local level, and the buy vs. build conversation deepens, partners now sit at the intersection of innovation.

But with further disruption ahead, the Australian channel must lead the conversation.


30 INTERVIEW

James Henderson took up the ARN editor’s role on April 4. Over the last few years, James has been heading up Computerworld and Reseller News in New Zealand.

But don’t expect a Kiwi accent because James hails from Newcastle in the UK where the distinctive Geordie accent is worn like a badge of honour. Think Monty Python’s Eric Idle or Sting or the movie Billy Elliot.

His enthusiasm about ARN and the Australian channel community is infectious. James talked to ARN president and publisher, SUSAN SEARLE, about his love of football (his team is Sunderland), his sporting journalism background and how he ended up writing technology in Auckland.

SCORING GOALS WITH ARN

What was your background before you

came into technology journalism?

I started my career in journalism 13 years ago as a features writer for A Love Supreme magazine, which is an English Premier League football fanzine (a magazine for fans) covering Sunderland AFC – my local football team.

From the age of 15 I remember writing stories, cycling to pick the magazines up from the printers and then standing outside of football grounds across England selling copies for £1.50, rain or sunshine. So it was a very hands on role.

After studying journalism at university I became a sports reporter for The Times of London, covering the North East football beat and reporting on Premier League matches.

Across Australia and New Zealand, I’ve also worked for The West Australian and The New Zealand Herald, focusing on football, cricket, rugby and golf.

How did you end up in New Zealand?

After finishing my studies I was commissioned to report on the 2011 Rugby World Cup for a range of newspapers in the UK, following the England national team on the ground in New Zealand. Unfortunately, England didn’t perform well so after losing to France in the quarter-finals, I decided to make use of my free time and travel around New Zealand.

A few months turned into a six and then after a year of making my way around the North and South Islands, I returned to Auckland to resume my journalism career.

Why the IT industry?

Sport was naturally my first choice but I struggled to dislodge the established journalists in the industry, so I made the conscious decision to refocus my efforts in another industry.

And that’s when IT cropped up. Initially, I was drawn to the industry because of the people within it, and the noise it was creating within the mainstream press.

Given New Zealand’s reputation as early adopters of technology, the new and exciting technologies coming to market ensured no day was ever the same, and it helped bring me up to speed pretty quickly. But crucially,


INTERVIEW 31

it’s rewarding to work in a market which evolves at such a rapid pace, and continues to open my eyes to the genius of this industry and the people within it.

You’ve been at IDG in New Zealand

for two years and have edited both

Computerworld and Reseller News,

so you’ve seen IT from the user and

channel perspective. Has that been

valuable? Why?

As Editor of ARN, I believe my role is twofold – to inform the channel but also to listen to it. While my job is to better enable partners, I also believe an editor should capture the mood of the market and translate it back through the media, ensuring a two-way conversation.

During my time editing Computerworld and Reseller News in New Zealand, I covered the industry from end-user to reseller to distributor to vendor, which offered an extra dimension of the market when engaging with partners.

Too often distributors and vendors communicate their own perspective to partners, often bypassing the needs and understanding of the resellers. But resellers’ views stem directly from the needs of their customers and are essential market intelligence.

Through working in the end-user space across enterprise, I’ve seen firsthand the changing demands that are placed on partners, and I believe this provides me with a deeper understanding of what the resellers are encountering and the outcomes they need to achieve.

What have been the highlights of

developing the Reseller News brand

and community?

During my early days at Reseller News, it quickly became clear that bringing distributors, vendors and resellers under one roof was a tough ask. In fact, it rarely happened. Because ARN has helped develop the Australian community, it’s more common to catch-up as an entire industry. But that model didn’t exist in New Zealand

With the relaunch of Reseller

News, there’s a different dynamic in the New Zealand channel today and collectively, we have helped reunite the industry, bringing old faces back together and reigniting past relationships. We’re pleased to see the market responding to our approach.

This was best summed up during the inaugural Reseller News ICT Industry Awards last October, when 300 industry figures joined together for a night celebrating the Kiwi channel, something nobody believed could happen 12 months prior.

Following on from the awards, the launch and rise of After Hours has perhaps been our greatest achievement as a team.

This no strings attached

networking event regularly brings together key industry figures and we’re humbled to see this has become a key date on the monthly social calendar.

As one reseller put it; “Reseller News is the Switzerland of the channel” – and it’s this neutral platform that has helped regain the channel’s trust and facilitated a sense of community.

Now we are planning the first Women in ICT Awards (WIICTA)for June, with a strong agenda to celebrate gender diversity in the NZ ICT industry.

Why are you moving to ARN?

Through my work with Reseller News, I’ve established significant relationships in Australia and believe the move represents an exciting career progression.

I hope to draw on my trans-Tasman perspective to develop the editorial footprint of ARN, ensuring our content enhances the industry we are serving.

I believe there is an opportunity to both deepen and widen the channel conversation in Australia. While traditions and reputations must be respected, there is a need to uncover new aspects of the local market and seek opinions from the new breed of partners as well as the mainstream.

ARN has the opportunity to ensure the conversation is reflective of the changing channel, whether this be breakthrough vendors, startups or born in the cloud providers - irrespective of size or stature.

With respect to the 25 years of ARN, I hope to lay the groundwork for ongoing change, magnifying the key issues relevant to resellers. I look forward to gaining a deeper understanding of

what makes the channel tick.

Over those 25 years, ARN

has developed a strong

community and reputation.

How do you view your

appointment as editor and

the editorial responsibilities?

I appreciate the size of the task at hand, but with the help of my editorial colleagues, we will put channel partners at the heart of our content strategy, better serving the market through a blend of

originality and deeper analysis.It’s a great honour to take over

editorship of ARN. Having observed the Australian market evolve from across the Tasman, I look forward to building upon ARN's long-standing reputation within the industry. In this role, my core journalistic values will always remain; built around integrity, accuracy and objectivity.

You developed a wonderful network

in New Zealand. How will you develop

your contacts in Australia?

My first real encounter with the Australian channel was during EDGE 2015, where I escorted the Kiwi contingent. In meeting with the majority of the 180 Aussies in attendance, I began to build my local network and look forward to expanding this further in the coming weeks and months. Please email me on [email protected]

”I believe there is an opportunity to both deepen and widen the

channel conversation in Australia. While traditions and reputations

must be respected, there is a need to uncover new aspects of the

local market and seek opinions from the new breed of partners as

well as the mainstream.”

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SUCCEEDING TOGETHER:

THE TRIUMPH OF SUCCESSFUL PARTNERSHIPSBuilding successful partnerships is paramount to the HP pedigree. Partners are vital to the success of any vendor and HP has worked across many verticals and markets with its partners to drive growth and revenue.

At its Partner Awards in February, HP awarded resellers for their successes. These three winners are examples of the triumphs partners across the country have when working with HP, the undisputed leader in the print space.

Enigma Business ProductsEnigma Business Products was named cMPS Partner of the Year and the company’s managing director, Shaun Hemberg, explained that HP has been there since the beginning working tirelessly to achieve joint success.

“When Enigma first opened in 2000, HP were the standout OEM/Vendor who provided us support, training and access to their programs,” he explained.

“When Enigma first opened we concentrated our sales focus on being a box shifting organisation. However, we saw after the first few years that there was a shift in the market from customers that they were looking for more than that from their suppliers. We decided that if we did not embrace this change and reorientate the way we did business we would be left behind. This decision and the support we have received from HP to help us change has enabled us to be where we are today.

In addition to managed print services, Enigma has built a successful practice providing customers with a wide gamut of other solutions including Pull Printing, Print environment Security analysis and resolution, Document Capture and Route and document management programs as well as a range of other solutions for varied IT requirements.

“Essentially they go hand in hand,” Hemberg continued. “It provides a future path for our customers once they have the HP hardware on site.”

The print landscape has changed considerably since Enigma opened its doors in 2000 and Hemberg explained the company has adjusted to suit the market with the help of HP.

Partnering with the right vendor is essential in managing the elevated customer expectation we service today comparatively to the past.

“The solutions [we offer] have certainly become more technical and I am grateful for the support we receive from the pre-sales and post sales guys at HP.” Shaun Hemberg

Rob Mesaros (HP Inc.), Shaun Hemberg (Enigma Business Products), Chris Hewlett (HP Inc.)

Simon Williams (Cartridges Direct), Rob Mesaros (HP Inc.)

Rob Mesaros (HP Inc.) Yogan Murugesu (Landmark Computers), Chris Hewlett (HP Inc.)

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“When it comes down to it – we have been able to work in partnership with HP, hand in hand to develop solutions using HP programs and channel support to exceed our clients’ requirements.

Cartridges DirectOne of the other great HP Print partner success stories is The HP Print Supplies Partner of the Year, CartridgesDirect. Simon Williams is the company’s managing director and said the decision to move toward offering HP genuine products was vital to the success of the business.

“We first became a partner with HP back in 2008. Before this we had been selling a wide range of remanufactured toner cartridges and compatibles from China,” Williams said.

“We saw that the quality of these products had been getting worse over time, primarily caused by aggressive price pressure. This in turn pushed the quality of the product down. Sales of genuine ink and toner had been increasing significantly as well, due to the poor quality of the generic products. At that time, Williams saw the opportunity to take the business online and partnered with HP.

“HP print solutions have been a key element of that direct model. From the very formation of Cartridges Direct HP has been a mainstay of our operation. They are the pioneers in many aspects of printer cartridge technology and, as pioneers in our segment it was natural that we would offer their products from the very outset.

Williams bet big on the online business and the company is reaping the rewards thanks to hard work from Cartridges Direct and support from HP, their trusted solutions partner.

“Since the beginning HP has been more than just a vendor, they truly have been a partner to CartridgesDirect,” he said.

“They have always taken a strong interest in the growth of the company and our approach to the marketplace. Having a business manager to work with has also been a key to our success. They have taken the time to understand our business.

“Winning the Supplies Partner of the year is something very special to us,” Williams said.

“It is testament to the work that has gone in over the years by all of our staff and I personally thank each and every one of them. It takes true dedication to get the business from a one man operation in a two car garage to where we are today.”

Landmark ComputersAnother success story from the HP Print partner ecosystem is Landmark Computers.

Servicing predominantly the

1-99 seat market while also working with customers up to 250 seats, the reseller sees every vertical as an opportunity. The team at Landmark has been selling print solutions since 1994 and the company’s managing director, Yogan Murugesu, explained that Landmark is a one stop place for all IT requirements for small business customers.

“We have other solutions around servers, networking, and PC hardware but our focus in the print space has intensified in the last six to seven years,” he said.

“We have been a long standing partner with HP, and it’s because they have the best product range and solutions in the space that we sell into.”

Murugesu went on to say that the market has changed significantly in the past decade and HP had been instrumental in helping Landmark address the changing needs of clients.

“More and more business are trying to reduce the amount of printing from a carbon footprint point and are trying to go paperless where possible. We have also found some customers prefer to spend a little bit more, go to a better device and share it among more users. That means selling less units in certain cases.

He added that in the face of these changes, offering products renowned for quality like those in the HP print portfolio has been vital to the continued success of Landmark and that the HP team were constantly working with his team to explore new opportunities. Murugesu also said the markets for multi-function printers (MFP) had picked up and customers were also looking more at HP’s business inkjet range.

The team at Landmark navigated the changing landscape expertly and have become one of the most successful resellers in the country. This success has culminated in the company being named HP Print Partner of the Year.

“It’s very pleasing, because a lot of hard work is put in,” Murugesu added. “In addition, it also opens a lot of doors for us, because we can be seen as a trustworthy partner for HP.”

He went on to say that customers recognised the value in having a reseller that was also a trusted HP partner as it demonstrated the faith HP has in the company and that both the partner and end

user have the backing of a global giant committed to quality and continued success.

All three winners agreed that partnering with HP was one of the best decisions they ever made in their business as it formed a large part of the foundation of their success.

“HP also has programs in place that make it worthwhile for the customer and the reseller. Most importantly, the HP team that we deal with is fantastic and has always helped us and our customers where possible.” Yogan Murugesu

“They have always taken a strong interest in the growth of the company and our approach to the marketplace. Having a business manager to work with has also been a key to our success.” Simon Williams


34 TECH WATCH/MARKET DISRUPTORS

They are the big two - IoT and Big Data - and these game-changing technologies are set to continue to gain traction in 2016 and beyond.

IoT is all about interconnecting and creating intelligence from the myriad of connected devices. It is a leading edgetechnology that can offer sizeable cost savings and ongoing

productivity enhancements.

Big Data is a term for data sets so large or complex that traditional data processing applications are inadequate. While challenges include analysis, capture, storage and privacy, companies are seeing huge benefits due to the improved analysis of data and data correlation. Companies can make better decisions because of greater operational efficiency, cost reduction and loweredrisk.

ARN deputy editor, HAFIZAH OSMAN, examines the two biggest market disruptors for 2016 - IoT and Big Data - highlighting the growing and evolving partner opportunity.

IOT AND BIG DATA:THE DISRUPTION STARTS HERE


MARKET DISRUPTORS/TECH WATCH 35

The volume of data that is pouring out of the great etchnological

shift is growing exponentially. It is obvious. So it it just as obvious that the game-changing technologies for 2016 will revolve around unlocking the potential value of this data. Right at the top of the list are platforms that facilitate productivity and collaboration in data science.

Two of these game-changing and interconnected technologies are the Internet of Things (IoT) and Big Data. Channel players claim these technologies will continue to gain traction in 2016 and beyond and will pave the way for channel opportunities.

Teradata A/NZ chief data scientist, Ross Farrelly, said these technologies are enabling a ‘listening framework’ – letting organisations actively analyse large data streams in real-time, and an increased utilisation of decision-making platforms that can augment human decision making processes.

Farrelly said IoT is all about interconnecting and creating intelligence from the myriad of connected devices.

“IoT is a game-changing phenomenon that can offer enormous cost savings and massive productivity enhancements,” he said.

As for Big Data, Farrelly said it creates huge amounts of data sets which are so large or complex that traditional data processing applications cannot adequately analyse them. However, if companies can meet these challenges they can make better decisions, realise operational efficiencies and cost reduction and also reduced risk.

“The value of these technologies heavily depends on the use cases driving their

adoption. But for organisations implementing data analytics technology for marketing purposes, or to gain ongoing insight into business processes to maximise productivity, the platforms that support real-time analysis and action are important.

“Technology that enables real-time analysis and action can be integrated with business systems to provide organisations with the insight needed to make decisions quickly. This ability makes organisations more responsive, which is important in today’s competitive landscape,” he said.

Oracle A/NZ Big Data specialist, Vicky Falconer, said 2016 is going to be an exciting year as Big Data will be a game changer, driven by the rapid emergence of visualisation tools that are bringing new insight into the hands of the business user.

Falconer claimed advanced analytics and machine learning, in addition to IoT, will be the driving force of Big Data.

“They are often talked about separately, but really IoT is the means for generating the data, which Big Data then takes and adds to and enriches what

MuleSoft A/NZ regional vice-president, Jonathan Stern, said the tools and technologies are already in place to take advantage of Big Data and IoT. It’s now a case of putting the non-technical aspects in place: the processes and people.

Then, he said, it will be about execution.

“IoT is creating a lot more data, contributing to the Big Data pool. However, often this resides in disconnected products, devices and services. When this happens, valuable data becomes siloed,” he said.

Stern addressed three challenges that enterprises need to address to leverage IoT:

1. Real-time collection of data from connected devices

2. Processing of that information to make it actionable

3. Connecting that data to operational systems to enable the creation of new products and service offerings

Stern said the key to solving the connectivity issues to deliver successful IoT initiatives is through open APIs.

“APIs allow disparate systems and data to talk to each other, creating a seamless flow of information from one source to another. We’ll start to see more organisations turn to an API strategy as IoT initiatives proliferate

“To thrive in the new business landscape, organisations need to be agile. As always, differentiation is the key to positioning. As Big Data and IoT adoption accelerates, businesses that offer specialist skills around integration of disparate data sets will benefit most,” he added.

you have already got, so that decisions can be made on it.”

In addition, Falconer said new tools, especially in the areas of Cloud and mobile, are empowering and speeding up innovation in businesses by enabling them to move rapidly and adopt new technologies like Big Data and IoT, and test and develop new applications that utilise them.

“As a result, innovation is moving into the heart of the business rather than being at the edge. A key impact of this is on the business culture itself. Innovation and insight become the role of everyone in the business, not just specialised departments,” Falconer said.

CHALLENGESEMC A/NZ mid-market inside sales and distribution general manager, Brett Harris, said the market has been talking about IoT and Big Data for years now, but many organisations still don’t have the infrastructure in place to manage them correctly.

“Businesses won’t fully benefit from these trends until they have the tools to manage the sheer amount of data that will be created, utilise that data and then give their staff the

IS BIG DATA/IoT SOMETHING THAT THE MARKET IS READY FOR NOW?

“The advantages

of IoT and Big Data

is that it enables

businesses to get

closer to their

own customers,

providing new

insights about them,

and enables them to

then deliver a better

service” - EMC’S BRETT HARRIS

WHY IoT AND BIG DATA ARE GOOD


36 TECH WATCH/MARKET DISRUPTORS

Partner organisations that can offer situational awareness across connected devices and help keep IoT from becoming a cyber security nightmare will quickly differentiate themselves from the pack, according to FireEye A/NZ’s Rich Costanzo

“This is particularly true as most IoT device manufacturers are driven by cost and pay little attention to security. Resellers need to be able to help their clients not only identify all the risks in their environment, but also invest in the ability to develop a security strategy.”

Allied Telesis Australia country manager, Scott Penno, said IoT represents an opportunity for new devices and technologies to be deployed and existing devices to be retrofitted and/or connected, while Big Data poses an opportunity and a challenge as the volume of data is growing exponentially and the challenge is to find the knowledge and insight within the information to make smarter decisions.

“IoT and Big Data present many different opportunities for the channel from trusted advisor or consultant on new technologies and services through to creating platforms that can leverage this data and provide insight and intelligence to their customers.

“One particular challenge for the channel in the market today is adding value and differentiating themselves – and IoT and Big Data provide plenty of opportunity for this to happen,” he said.

However, Penno mentioned that traditional resellers need to understand that the world is moving towards consumption based models and that organisations are less interested in owning things and more interested in paying for the benefit those technologies deliver.

“Subscription based business models, Cloud-based services and innovative new applications and services are all ways in which traditional resellers can make changes to improve their chances of success in the future.”

Schneider Electric Pacific channel and alliances general manager, Muralee Kanagaratnam, is optimistic about the opportunities in this space. He said there has been a lot of hype around IoT, edge computing and Big Data, but yet this has not been rolled out on a mass scale to date.

“Where there is complexity there is margin - this presents a golden opportunity for channel partners. As the market starts to look at innovative ways to stay ahead of the game, they will rely on the channel to be the trusted advisor.”

Whilst the technologies may be becoming more “plug and play”, the supporting infrastructure and environments needs to be managed – this is where the channel will play a key role in supporting their customers and continuing to service them, said Kanagaratnam.

“This means helping customers generate business advantages from their investments in technology, particularly as they pursue digital transformation, or take over responsibility for more technology functions through managed services.

“Many customers are looking for guidance and innovative game changers, not necessarily a solution to a problem. Channel partners have a responsibility and an opportunity to usher in successful IoT and Big Data implementations by exploring the adoption of technologies that help customer achieve business objectives,” he added.

on and on. Companies will need the will and the way to detect, analyse, and respond to these kind of attacks,” he added.

Bitdefender security specialist, Alexandra Gheorghe said each market will embrace IoT and Big Data advancements at its own pace.

He claimed that, at this moment, companies find it very challenging to manage the explosion of data generated by mobile and connected devices. Another issue affecting all markets is the need to standardise IoT applications, as the lack of interoperability among devices and objects remains a major hurdle for widespread IoT adoption.

FireEye A/NZ SE director, Rich Costanzo, also spoke about security as an issue.

With an increasing number of devices connecting to both the enterprise and critical infrastructure, he said security teams need complete visibility into their networks and the capability to quickly detect and shut down a compromised device.

“While many vendors differentiate between the risks of the various types of devices – whether BYOD, remote and onsite, or even connected and disconnected – in reality, these are all part of the soon-to-be worldwide collection of 50 billion IoT devices.

“Every one of those endpoints is a cyber security risk; a first point of attack and network vulnerability. This means there is a greater attack surface to be exploited and businesses are at disadvantage because an attacker only needs to breach one device to be successful, whereas an organisation has to protect all of them,” Costanzo said.

CHANNEL OPPORTUNITIES businesses to get closer to their own customers, providing new insights about them, and enables them to then deliver a better service.

“But the primary disadvantage of IoT and Big Data is that they will put significant pressure on a customer’s IT infrastructure, whether that be private infrastructure or Cloud-based. In order to maximise these technologies they must ensure that infrastructure is ready before implementation,” he said.

Blue Coat A/NZ chief information security officer, Damien Manuel, said with Cloud migration, apps and services require data protection across multiple premises.

Manuel said as workers become ever-increasingly IT-savvy and the number of Cloud-based, often-free solutions to their specific Big Data and IoT requirements become available, more and more of them are bypassing the IT department for a quick fix.

“They are easier to procure and use without going through the usual IT channels. Moving to a Cloud-based solution means that sensitive data now moves freely between the enterprise and the Cloud. The use of unsanctioned Cloud applications has created an intensified risk of internal/external data exposure, malware attacks from suspicious Cloud providers and the problematic visibility and security issues.”

He also said with the increased use of Big Data and IoT, the sheer number of advanced security threats will grow every day.

“So will the sophistication of cyberattacks, custom malware, drive-by downloads, watering-hole attacks, and the list goes

“Where there is complexity there is margin - this presents

a golden opportunity for channel partners.”

Muralee Kanagaratnam, Schneider Electric


MARKET DISRUPTORS/TECH WATCH 37

“They will put significant pressure on customer’s IT infrastructure, whether that be private infrastructure or Cloud-based. In order to maximise these technologies they must ensure that infrastructure is ready before implementation” - EMC’S BRETT HARRIS

WHY IoT AND BIG DATA CAN BE PROBLEMATIC

PREDICTIONS OF THE FUTURERiverbed Technology Asia-Pacific and Japan vice-president of solutions, Ian Raper, said it’s undeniable that IoT is poised to overhaul not only business, but every aspect of modern life.

“From fridges to fitness products in the domestic world, and everything from dialysis machines to dams in the enterprise realm, we can expect things that were never connected to soon come online. In fact, Gartner is predicting that a typical family home, in mature markets like Australia, could

contain several hundred smart objects by 2022.”

The expected boom in IoT and Big Data technologies opens the playing field for a range of business opportunities.

Raper mentioned every area of life – from work, to transport, healthcare and government service delivery – stands to benefit from the innovations and efficiencies made possible by a fully connected world resulting from IoT and Big Data.

“Focusing on the enterprise space, IoT presents opportunities to monitor and manage assets, automate processes and generate

significant savings on resources and manpower. Utility providers are already using connected smart meters to track usage and pre-empt surges in demand.

“Similarly, connected patient care systems are already allowing healthcare providers to track the health status of outpatients and adjust treatment where necessary,” he said.

Commvault principal architect, Chris Gondek, claimed today IoT and Big Data are staples of the business world but tomorrow and into the future, they will make their way into the everyday life of consumers – in the form of insurance premiums and healthcare.

“There are so many devices out there that can collect and send data, and the algorithms

to make sense of the data for business purposes are getting more intelligent and as the sources increase, the data repositories improve.

“One example is the ultimate end of benefits fraud, as analysis can eventually pick up on discrepancies when there is access to all the relevant data collection points of any individual collecting benefits,” he said.

But at the end of the day, according to Gondek, whether it’s a new feature or improvement in performance, it all boils down to greater productivity and a reduction in cost.

“With businesses taking more of a lead with regards to their technology spend, as opposed to the old days where this was dictated by the IT department, it is becoming more critical for us to seek out these new technologies as our IT costs are driven down,” he said.

BITDEFENDER SECURITY SPECIALIST, ALEXANDRA GHEORGHE, STRESSED BUSINESSES SHOULD

NOT IGNORE SECURITY.

1. “The first step to take is to

create organisational rules

and update network security

infrastructure so that it can

detect, and in some cases

control, data transmitted

to and from the new smart

devices that form the IoT.”

2. “Organisations should

embrace a risk-management

approach and reinforce the IT

infrastructure and systems to

restrict data access through

firewalls, endpoint security

solutions and proper policies, as

well as monitor networks 24/7.”

3. “An administrator should

be alerted if an unidentified

device is connecting to

the network. Lastly, it’s

essential to understand how

a device works, analysing its

ability to store and transfer

confidential corporate data.”

THREE KEY SECURITY STEPS TO TAKE

“With businesses taking more of a lead with regards to their technology spend, as opposed to the old days where this was dictated

by the IT department, it is becoming more critical for us to seek out these new technologies as our IT costs are driven down”

- CommVault’s Chris Gondek


40 ROUNDTABLE/FLASH FORWARD

Flash storage continues to make a big impact in the industry, particularly in enterprise infrastructure. It is considered one of two big disruptions (alongside virtualisation) that have upended the enterprise datacentre and infrastructure stack for large companies.

With the advent of flash, many players are looking to disrupt the longstanding incumbents. Certainly, flash storage is gaining popularity and changing the way companies are using technology internally.

With that in mind, a group of experts gathered at an exclusive roundtable to discuss the latest trends in the storage market, highlighted where flash technology makes sense, and examined the market opportunities for businesses and service providers. Jennifer O’Brien and Hafizah Osman report.

This roundtable was sponsored by

Westcon-Comstor, Avnet, Tintri, and Nimble Storage

Flash Forward:

The storage evolution


FLASH FORWARD/ROUNDTABLE 41

Guests:Bede Hackney NIMBLE STORAGE

Graham Schultz

TINTRI

Matthew Hurford

NETAPP

John Martin

NETAPP

Ean Mackney

WESTCON-COMSTOR

Jason Stegeman

TINTRI

Paul Oxley

AVNET

Rodney Gedda

TELSYTE

Andrew McGee

HDS

Roshan Ratnayake

LOGICALIS

George Kazangi BLUE CENTRAL

Moderators:Hafizah Osman

Jennifer O’Brien

Photos: Maria Stefina

Rodney Gedda, Telsyte senior analyst There are a number of flash storage opportunities for partners as the technology has evolved from the device level to the Cloud arena.

“Flash enables customers to transition to multiple delivery models (hybrid Cloud); it goes hand-in-hand with software defined; it adds value to equipment and as-a-service; and it enables customers to focus on the business outcome and total cost of ownership,” Gedda said, adding as costs fall, flash can capture more disk-based workloads.

He said today’s applications including Big Data processing and real-time analytics; virtual servers and desktops; mobile device integration; on-premise and Cloud Disaster Recovery; as well as industry automation are all driving the adoption of flash technology.

Graham Schultz, Tintri A/NZ managing directorPartners are the voice to market, as they are able to spend more time offering deeper consultative services now that the task-intensive storage management of the past is alleviated with the advancements of flash. Customers are also able to reallocate budget thanks to the associated cost savings from flash.

“From a partner perspective, that budget is available to offer higher level services around the business transformation. And we're seeing that partners are evolving to offer those types of services rather than somebody sitting doing grunt work installing and configuring storage arrays. So that shift in the partner ecosystem is happening for the right reasons and it has got benefits for the customer and partner.”

John Martin, NetApp Asia-Pacific director of strategy and technology There are a myriad of opportunities associated with flash, but the channel community needs to be very clear and think of flash in terms of people and not workloads.

“It is about people. Different kinds of people will want different kinds of flash solutions. You can sit there and try and map workloads. But the question isn’t ‘does this workload run well on this product or that product’. The question is, ‘what is it that that particular person emotionally resonates with?’ What do they see as their future of their IT environment? What do they see as their specific problems that lie outside that technical thing of, ‘does it run well’?”

Jason Stegeman, Tintri senior systems engineerThe channel is crucial in communicating the promise of flash.

“Having the right channel and having the channel that can ultimately articulate the business value is crucial. In this area, it is about understanding multiple stacks in the infrastructure. There's networking, compute, there's applications, and there's business processes. And that's the difference — having the partners that can articulate what that flash provides in a certain context or a certain business application.”

Matthew Hurford, NetApp A/NZ technical sales directorBut partners need to expand the skill sets and reach out to a new audience.

“We're increasingly having conversations away from IT. We're having fewer conversations with storage guys and infrastructure guys and CTOs and far more conversations with line of business and other C level folks. We're having more of an audience with risk and compliance people who are suddenly worried about this Cloud first strategy and what does it mean with data? That for me is a shift for vendor and that's something we're going to have to encourage our partners to further stretch their few resources to go and do. That's a different set of skills.”

Andrew McGee, Hitachi Data Systems A/NZ chief technology officer“In a way, we're kind of making the badge on the IT kit irrelevant to them where they just want the outcome. And there are a lot of customers now that just want to buy consumption-based pricing. All the different ways we need to sell IT has changed.”

He said the company doesn’t want to sell platforms, but solutions. “We want to try to get partners to a point where we have a solution conversation with the customer, rather than a point product discussion. It is a journey. We are not there, but we want to get to the point where channels can articulate that. They can wrap their own value around it. We have some channel partners that specialise in things like databases. So they will bring different pieces of jigsaw to the table that we won’t be able to provide. Finding the right mix of channel partners that can bring those pieces of jigsaw together is crucial and means we have a much more compelling proposition for the customer.”

Bede Hackney, Nimble Storage A/NZ managing directorThe biggest task today is delivering innovation at the business process level.



“I would argue that probably one of the biggest challenges that everyone faces is helping customers understand what they can do to innovate in their business process based on leveraging the innovative technology that we're delivering. We've all passionately agreed that there's innovation in business process, there's innovation in technology. But the innovation in technology is only useful if it drives innovation in a business process. Our customers are stumbling on the potential for the innovation in a business process.”

Additionally, Hackney said the process is only half of the challenge. “You have to fix the process and help the customer see what's possible in their process, but we also want to deliver storage that's capable of much greater performance, but storage isn't the only thing in the datacentre.”

Ean Mackney, Westcon-Comstor FlexPod business manager A/NZNow more than ever, the onus is on the channel to articulate value propositions and deliver business outcomes.

“It's incumbent upon us as vendors and distributors to really go out and enable the channel and make sure that they're having the right conversations so they're fully taught to actually go out and iterate why flash is a good idea.”

Certainly, there is no slowing down the flash momentum, Mackney added.

“My major go to market this year is actually converged infrastructure in conjunction with NetApp and Cisco and all we're doing all year is

coaching partner SEs and salespeople on how to go to market and have that conversation on top of with an all flash and then be ready and enabled to have a complete Cloud discussion. My primary go to market is to make sure that we're all ready to rock.”

WHAT IS THE PROMISE FLASH?

Jason Stegeman, Tintri A/NZ senior systems engineerIt’s about how businesses modify their business process to take advantage of flash? “What applications can they start creating? And more importantly, what can we start creating in conjunction with my internal and external business customers? What services can we start creating based on the fact that we’ve taken care of what

is always a problematic tier? We've all heard of VDI, it’s happening, but only since flash has come into the equation on a wide scale has VDI really started to actually take off. So it’s writing the applications based on that storage tier.”

Matthew Hurford, NetApp A/NZ technical sales director“In 1910 Henry Ford painted his car black. He painted his car black because it's the fastest drying paint. He was managing the constraint in his process. To be honest, we're doing more than that, but we're almost back managing the constraint and we're removing the

“Innovation in technology is only useful if it drives innovation in a

business process.”BEDE HACKNEY, NIMBLE STORAGE

What do you think are the most workable areas of your infrastructure to develop a hybrid Cloud?

61%STORAGE

40%SERVERS

37%APPLICATIONS

31%DISASTER RECOVERY

SOURCE: TELSYTE

How is flash leading to innovation?

Matthew HurfordNETAPP A/NZ TECHNICAL SALES DIRECTORInnovation is doing things you didn’t do before to get a different outcome. A lot of flash at the moment is being deployed in an optimisation phase and IT has been going through that for a long time. At the moment, it’s providing cost savings whether in operational management or in speed that provides optimisation. But there are only a few use cases where customers are truly driving innovation. And that’s the next challenge for business. If they truly want that digital transformation to take place, they need to figure out how they change their business processes, which is ten times harder to get innovated outcomes. Businesses are doing fundamentally different things to what they used to do. The opportunity is there. They can free up the money from the optimisation phase, they can free up the people from the optimisational phase, and now they can go and invest in dev-ops and they can do some funky things.

Rodney GeddaTELSYTE SENIOR ANALYST If you look at some of the innovation projects — optical, holographic storage (taking solid state electronics out of the equation and looking at ways to store data in different ways) — that could very much become reality in the future and we could see that flash as we know it today is just another step along the path of innovation.

Bede HackneyNIMBLE STORAGE A/NZ MANAGING DIRECTOR Don’t confuse innovation in storage with innovation in business. Those are two different things. I passionately agree that what’s important is the innovation that we drive in business. I think it's interesting the innovation we drive in our infrastructure to support the innovation in business. Three or four years ago we were in tick phase where our sales, and everyone around this table, were adding flash into their arrays with ground up or bolt on, and that was to address speed and all the rest of it, but I believe that we are into the top phase. Conversations that I’ve had with customers where they were unclear what went wrong, and then realised that their application had completely changed its performance dynamics because of the speed of the storage. Then they realised they could run that query every half hour instead of overnight — that scenario is driving business process innovation.

In terms of evolution, there have been a number of revolutions of storage. There was direct-attached and then it was modular-networked attached and now it is irrefutable that flash is disrupting the storage market. Look at the legacy vendors and the revenue trends and look at the upstarts and the revenue trends. I agree what’s going on in the optical space is the next phase of innovation in two to five or seven years.

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constraint, which was the performance in the storage layer. So now we can go and do interesting things around agile development and that kind of stuff because now we've enabled and we've freed up the resources to do it.”

Paul Oxley, Avnet Technology Solutions business unit directorThat speed difference is a big deal for the customer in terms of time to market. “When you've got something you want to get there, you want to compete with everybody else, being able to go quick and go hard, is so important. If you can't do that with a SAN, you can do that with flash. That might be the difference between you being first or second to market – and that's a huge business advantage.”

HOW ARE CONVERSATIONS EVOLVING?

Ean Mackney, Westcon-Comstor FlexPod business manager A/NZHe said what you want to really look at when you're having that conversation with your client is not all data is created equal. “That still holds true to this very day. Go out and actually have that conversation, figure out what is going to fit on what device based on the applications that they're providing and using in their environment and then have that conversation. I know it's a bit passé to say but that's where the Cloud consultancy piece comes into it because it drives that into some newer conversations. Flash is cool in storage and the story about flash is cool. Customers will ask what you are doing around this. Drive it out and then we get to have a longer, larger conversation around the broadness of our portfolios, around what we're doing with our software, with our integration, and that's where we really drive home an actual business value. And that's where innovation can come from.”

Roshan Ratnayake, Logicalis solutions architect, datacenter and Cloud servicesAll conversations involve delivering

MATTHEW HURFORDNETAPP A/NZ TECHNICAL SALES DIRECTORFlash plays its role in a bigger picture. If you look at what most companies are trying to achieve at the moment around business agility, I think flash helps companies be more agile. It's more than just a storage media itself, it requires deep application integration, it requires that you have data agility and data mobility. And we're seeing customers adopt it wholesale. We're absolutely putting forward our complete portfolio of flash products now, first and foremost, for every primary workload.

EAN MACKNEYWESTCON-COMSTOR BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT SALES MANAGERMy position on flash innovation and going to market is that it is an additive to a lot of the things that we're already achieving out there when we're talking to our customers. From a distribution perspective, when we're looking at how we're helping business partners get enabled and out to market, we need to be making sure that we're enabling them to be aware of what the flash conversation is and what it brings to the market.

If you're not out there having the conversation, then somebody else will be with your end-users. Flash is a key driver to giving you that efficiency, that high latency, giving you the best type of result for whatever application you're driving and then helping them drive that out to Cloud. At many levels, we need to have a Cloud conversation with this as well and that's why it also helps

to build an initial energy for that conversation and then we can go out and talk about the big picture.

JOHN MARTINNETAPP ASIA-PACIFIC DIRECTOR OF STRATEGY AND TECHNOLOGYOddly enough, despite its initial success in the marketplace, people are not buying flash for its performance, they're buying it for what performance actually delivers to them in terms of massive operations of simplification. There is that aspect in the marketplace. What we really see as the major benefit is the fact that people can basically reduce their overall cost to their entire IT environment by more than 40 per cent over a multi-year period because of that operational simplification that flash enables. And I think that's the real game changer.

JASON STEGEMANTINTRI SENIOR SYSTEMS ENGINEERFlash is not really a differentiator anymore; everyone has it. It's really about what you do with that flash storage and how you utilise it. What we're seeing is, more focus is moving towards the application. The application owner doesn't care if it's on flash or if it's in the Cloud. They care about how to manage the application, how to manage their data, and if it scales up and scales out. And the focus is, how does flash enable that? Issues such as latency and speed will pop out for flash, as well as operational savings from an environmental point of view because datacentre rack space is expensive, as is power and cooling.

I think it's going to be very interesting now that you start getting different types of flash and seeing what flash is going to evolve into. There are some new technologies coming out, so we need to figure out how that enables business outcomes. Flash is not unique, it's not something that really changes, it's one part of a very complex infrastructure stack.

ANDREW MCGEEHITACHI DATA SYSTEMS A/NZ CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICERCustomers aren't buying technology for the technology anymore, they're buying technology for an outcome. And they're not too concerned on what the technology is as long as they can get to the outcome and they can measure it and they can get those results. Also, flash isn't just about performance, it is around the simplicity.

People who are going all flash on the datacentre today want to use their precious resources and people resources to focus on other things rather than tuning IT equipment for the right tier of applications. So the simplicity, the reduction in management overhead, the reduction in environmental costs, etc. is not just about performance as a whole. There are a whole range of factors that people are buying flash for today.

BEDE HACKNEYNIMBLE STORAGE A/NZ MANAGING DIRECTORWhat's interesting about flash is that I would argue it's the single most significant in innovation

Q: How is flash storage a game changer and what are some main benefits for customers?

What they said


FLASH FORWARD/ROUNDTABLE 45

in storage since 1956 when the hard drive was invented. If you look at pretty much everything else that's happened in between it's all additive and evolutionary rather than revolutionary. So, if you look at the lifecycle of storage, since the '50s, it's the most interesting thing that has happened.

The other thing I would say is that I completely agree that operational simplicities are a real thing. We do see customers buying flash, whether it's all flash or all hybrid flash for performance, but it's not really for the technology, it's really for the application outcome that that performance is delivering. Absolutely, operational efficiency is probably the most important thing that's going on in storage right now. And I think flash is really only the tip of the iceberg in terms of technologies that are driving operational efficiencies. Some things such as Big Data analytics and taking a predictive approach to how we monitor and manage storage arrays are really driving that operational efficiency to the next level.

PAUL OXLEYAVNET BUSINESS UNIT DIRECTORFlash is about innovation right through the channel. It is about how it has allowed end users to come up with innovative solutions that they couldn't have afforded to. Some of that is due to the operational components and the price of flash.

Where the challenge is picking up, is that it is allowing that integration, it's allowing the solution, which again, comes back to the fact that it's about an outcome, it's not about providing a bunch of different technologies. It's about why is this an appropriate technology that can deliver the price performance that allows us to get to really good business outcomes and that hopefully allows people to be innovative with their allocation of resources.

GEORGE KAZANGIBLUE CENTRAL MANAGING DIRECTORFrom a service provider point of view, flash causes a problem for us as much as an opportunity. I'll start with the easy one, the opportunity. Most service providers or truly multitenant environments are generally IO bound, not disk bound or space bound so we find ourselves buying a lot more space than we actually require in getting the performance to handle the peaks and troughs. So flash addresses that.

Where it causes us some problems is with the developers that have all this performance now and don't quite code as efficiently as possible. So, I think flash will have its own challenges in a few years when that catches up to us, but for the moment, we're taking advantage of all the extra IOs we've got at the moment.

RODNEY GEDDATELSYTE ENTERPRISE IT SENIOR ANALYSTAll of a sudden, storage has become sexy. I'm interested in this whole concept of the best outcome using the best type of technology, and that isn't automatically a Cloud service or on-prem service, it's a combination of both. And flash is increasingly playing a big part of that.

A lot of data is now born in flash, so in terms of personal devices and industrial technologies, a lot of it is natively flash and a lot of data is being sent from the endpoint through to on-prem systems to managed service providers to the Cloud. On the topic of operational efficiencies, software has a lot to answer for in storage over the past decade. We haven't seen a lot of innovation in software, in storage management

software, but we've seen a lot of innovation infrastructure in components. But there's still a lot of innovation in how we manage our data, particularly with the influx of Big Data processes and so forth into that mix.

GRAHAM SCHULTZTINTRI A/NZ MANAGING DIRECTORSo many IT organisations are facing the changes, and many are really struggling to be able to deliver on these business outcomes and effectives. Most of us are talking to enterprises struggling with that evolution and I feel the combination of the technology, and the smarts that we've all touched on are really helping organisations address their internal business requirements to compete effectively with a public Cloud. So, I do see it as an important element in the business and IT organisation's to deliver on good outcomes internally.

ROSHAN RATNAYAKELOGICALIS SOLUTIONS ARCHITECTIn terms of what we see as a solutions integrator, customers are coming to us but they're not asking for flash. They're not saying, “Give me a bunch of flashing disks”. Flash is, at the end of the day, just a building block of converged infrastructure or hyper converged storage.

When we talk about operational efficiencies, businesses don't want to deal with the day to day managing of high ops, latency, and performance and that's where flash can solve those problems. They want to see the same efficiencies inside the organisation. So, again, flash can basically help the IT organisation basically meet those demands on time as well.

- HAFIZAH OSMAN

a business outcome. “Flash does have a business outcome, but it's about finding those workloads to show those outcomes. Here’s an example of an interesting use case in a hospital environment, where they implemented flash storage which meant that the doctors could get access to patient information a few seconds faster. The doctor could see more patients throughout the day, which means more people that he could actually cure.”

Graham Schultz, Tintri A/NZ managing director“If Henry Ford had asked his prospective customers what they wanted they would have asked for a faster horse. In the storage world just making storage faster based on the same old legacy architecture (LUNS/Volumes) is not the ideal. In a highly virtualised datacentre customers need to think about new and more efficient options available that are better aligned to the application – delivering true quality of service and eliminating on-going management.”

George Kazangi, Blue Central managing directorHe said we can either do the lazy approach and simply say, ‘you can buy more storage’ or we could make a shift like some of the other vendors and service providers are doing and actually charge per IOP. “And that will start to lead developers into understanding there's a cost in developing applications because at the moment storage is easy.

From either an internal chargeback point of view or service provider point of view, if we change based on performance we're going to start to hopefully have a thought process with developers around how can we better code this. I think that's one of the evolutions we need to get to. I think we're getting there. Content addressable storage is getting there. But I think to drive behaviour with consumers, we need to change the way that we sell it or teach the real cost of storage.”


46 THE EXPERTS/OPINION

The 3 things I’ve learned that have helped me during my careerPhil CameronWestconVP VENDOR

ALLIANCES APAC

AND DIRECTOR

OF VENDOR

ALLIANCES A/NZ

Whether you’re new to

our industry, starting

your career or like me

spent many a year building

your channel career in our

industry, what is it that

keeps you in the game?

Our industry is

going through massive

transformation. Every day there is a new

headline so how do we prepare ourselves for

this turbulence that no doubt will continue?

Change is inevitable so how do you prepare

yourself for it?

I’ve been very fortunate that I’ve built

my career from the ground up, beginning

at the most junior level by surrounding

myself with some fantastic leaders, channel

entrepreneurs, mentors and colleagues. On

the flip side, I’ve also seen and experienced

my fair share of bad managers, poor leaders

and questionable channel operators.

So what are the three things that got me

through and made a difference to my career?

1 Build and leverage your personal network

What would happen today if you are tapped

on the shoulder and suddenly your role no

longer exists or you are proactively seeking

a change? Just this week I’ve been assisting

four people from three different vendors and

a distributor where this has happened. Who

do you turn to for support, introductions, ideas

and a sounding board? For me, it was building

a trusted network from in and out of the

industry that I could

turn to when I needed

them. Throughout my

career, all — except

one — of my jobs

have come about

through my trusted

network.

2 Determine what you want

to be known forIt took me a while to

work this out, however

for me it is to be a senior

channel executive that can

be trusted and relied on

wherever I work. This clarity allowed me to set

some personal goals and helped me determine

what my own IP is and where I can add value

to the company I work for. Importantly, it is

also about how I can give back to the channel

industry and hopefully help some others along

way. My tip is think about what you want to be

known for and, as importantly, what you don’t

want to be known for.

3 The personal values you have today are the foundations that carry you

through the good and the badOur industry comes with many high demands,

expectations and constant pressure especially

at the end of a quarter. Some people want to

cut corners and do things that question the

integrity or compliance of that organisation.

My experience is these people get caught

out somewhere along the way. My tip is don’t

be tempted with anything that doesn’t sit right

with you or different to your personal values.

There are no short cuts.

Our industry is ever changing, fast paced

and rewarding. It’s an exciting time to be

amongst it as the channel will always play a

vital role.

Stickiness key to optimised Cloud strategy

Pip Marlow, Microsoft Australia MANAGING DIRECTOR

We are all working to transform

our businesses in this mobile-first,

Cloud-first world. But now you’ve

done the hard work to transition

to the Cloud – how do you build a

sustainably profitable business once

you’re there?

I believe a key pillar of building

an optimised Cloud strategy is

creating stickiness. “What,” I hear

you ask, “exactly does ‘creating

stickiness’ mean and why would I

want to do that?”

Creating stickiness is all about

looking for unique opportunities

to make your solutions invaluable.

Developing and deploying

intellectual property (IP) that

becomes part of the daily life of a

customer is one of the best ways to

increase stickiness. It is important

to remember that once your solution

is sold, you should also take steps to

drive adoption.

To learn more about

building an effective go-to-

market strategy for your IP, visit

the Driving Profitability with

Packaged IP modules in the

Profitability Challenge (www.

profitabilitychallenge.com).

”Don’t be tempted with anything that doesn’t sit right with you or different to your personal values”

1. Build and leverage your personal network2. Determine what you want to be known for3. Your personal values you have today are

the foundations that carry you through the good and the bad.

Cameron’s trio of tips

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By 2018, there will be six billion devices or things connected and 20 per centof business content will be authored by machines, resulting in a need for improved networking technologies.- GARTNER

48 MARKETS/NETWORKING

NEW AND FUTURE TECHNOLOGIES ARE PUSHING NETWORKS TO THE BREAKING POINT. BUT THE PROBLEM IS, MANY

ENTERPRISES CAN’T COPE WITH THE LATEST CROP OF DISRUPTIVE TECHNOLOGIES. ARN’S CHRIS PLAYER SPOKE TO EXPERTS

IN THE NETWORKING SPACE TO GET THEIR VIEWS ON SOME OF THE BIGGEST NETWORKING TRENDS.

The future of the network

Mark RansomEXCLUSIVE NETWORKS DATACENTRE

SALES OPERATIONS MANAGER

Ransom said there has been

a lot of talk in the market

about the software defined

networking (SDN) piece.

“Speeds and feeds are not

such an issue as they once

were as most of the boxes now

come with enough power. Now

the issue is 10gbps to where?

Will we go to 25 or 40?”

“It is very much chicken

and egg, a vendor will come out

with a 25, 40 or 50Gb solution

and then it is a matter of the

rest of the market catching

up and supplying products to

satisfy those requirements.

There is a lot of talk and

a lot less doing, because

people are waiting to see what

everyone else is doing.

“Information is much

more readily available around

products, which means

customers are coming into

the conversation with a pretty

good basic understanding of

the technologies.

“It is then up to the

partner to come in and

provide a solution based on

the technology the customer

identifies,” he added.

Jamie WarnerENERDS CHIEF EXECUTIVE

Warner said the biggest

networking trend he has seen

is the migration of businesses

to the Cloud with Microsoft

Office365 and the threat

of ransomware.

“The greatest impact

we are seeing with SMB on

networking appears to be

the transition away from a

local area network, Microsoft

Domain Controller & Active

Directory (AD) to AD in the

Cloud with Microsoft Azure

for authentication, control

and Single Sign On (SSO),”

he added.

He added that a ‘sticky’

SaaS monthly fee for licensing,

support and maintenance

would allow partners to

capitalise on this shift in SMB.

“The challenge will be

ensuring the feature set of

Cloud AD delivers the same as

on-premises. Also, a strong

solution for Files and Folders

in the Cloud is required to

replace local File Servers given

the local file server is usually

the domain controller. MSPs

and IT Providers will also need

to up-skill to take advantage of

the new technology,” he added.

Greg Barnes A10 NETWORKS A/NZ

MANAGING DIRECTOR

Barnes said there was a definite

trend in consolidation of

footprint within the datacentre.

“Datacentre consolidation

will be around as long as we

have datacentres. Customers

are looking for vendors and

partners that can give a

consolidated approach.

“There is a trend toward

alliances in a collaborative

type environment. A10 has a

number of these relationships

around security, for example.

“Customers are looking

for an all-purpose solution

and the consolidation

of vendors is not quite

there; we are still seeing

consolidation of all the vendors

forming alliances.

He said customers want

more focused partners, so the

company is all about enabling

the channel to deliver that focus.

“We are trying to find

the key partners who can

consolidate those environments

and add in security. The changing

environment and transitioning

to Cloud, virtualising the

environment, consolidated

management and security.”

“Customers are always

looking for the new vendors

and if partners are not offering

it as at least an option, then the

customer will not take them as

seriously as they might. Partners

need to be brave,” he added.

Nitin KucharaNK2IT MANAGING DIRECTOR

Kuchara mainly sells well-

established brands like Cisco

and Juniper as they offer

familiarity, but said customers

are looking for quality products

above all.

“Many of the IT managers

I talk to have been burned

badly and are hesitant to

take a risk in the journey to

hybrid Cloud.

“We discuss the solution

with the client and what

they are the most comfortable

with. That may involve an

established player or it

may involve a challenger

brand. It really depends

on the customer,”

he added.

THROUGH 2017, 25 per cent OF BIG DATA IMPLEMENTATIONS WILL FAIL TO DELIVER BUSINESS VALUE RESULTING FROM PERFORMANCE

PROBLEMS DUE TO INADEQUATE NETWORK INFRASTRUCTURE.- GARTNER


Mark FiorettoEMC GENERAL MANAGER SERVICE

PROVIDERS, SYSTEMS INTEGRATORS

AND ALLIANCES

Fioretto said EMC was

witnessing a move toward

converged and hyper-

converged infrastructures.

“Not only will these

infrastructure solutions change

the modern datacentre, but

they will change the nature of

businesses,” he added.

“Flash is becoming much

more mainstream. More than

80 per cent of Australian

businesses believe an all

flash datacentre that hosts all

active workloads will become

a reality within the next two to

five years.”

He mentioned Australia

is leading the way in Asia-

Pacific and Japan, with

26 per cent of businesses

surveyed most likely to have

deployed flash, as compared

to an average of 15.7 per cent

across the region.

“The opportunity for

the channel is to be more

consultative and educate

their customers on the

benefits of the modern IT

infrastructure and how it can

help them manage workloads

more efficiently. By advising

customers on how to plan

and implement a modern

datacentre, the customer will

continue to see its partner as a

critical piece of the IT puzzle.

“The storage market is

less generalised now. Partners

need to have a deep knowledge

of their customers’ business

to make a fully informed

recommendation about the

type of workloads that will be

managed. This will ensure the

right technology and service is

deployed, maximising results.

As the market changes, so

must the services partners are

offering,” he said.

John WaltersNEXTGEN MANAGING DIRECTOR

The distributor continues

to see a strong uptake and

growth of flash storage

technologies and Walters said

this remains a substantial

opportunity for the channel.

He added the majority of

NEXTGEN’s successful

deployments had been

around enhancing enterprise

application performance.

“This is the

transformational use of flash

and will continue to have

a dramatic impact on our

landscape,” he said.

“Traditional approaches

to storing and retrieving

enterprise data are broken.

This is due to the sheer

volume of data organisations

are faced with, and their

desire to make better use

of it. In today’s data-driven

world, businesses are

struggling with the conflicting

demands of managing

complex silos and providing

instant access to information.

“A more strategic overall

data management approach

is required, rather than just

selling more infrastructure

as budgets are under

pressure; datacentre space

is expensive; and migration

to the Cloud requires

different solutions.

“Channel partners

that help organisations

navigate this change and

elevate the discussion

around more strategic

business challenges like

application performance and

enabling Big Data will gain

credibility and win business,”

he said.

James ByrneINFINIDAT A/NZ COUNTRY MANAGER

Byrne said there is little doubt

that flash is what everyone

is talking about, but the

mass growth area was still in

unstructured data.

“Block and file is still the

growth engine for this but I am

also seeing a lot of growth in

Cloud,” he said.

“The successful service

providers are the ones

with expertise in the Cloud

migration.” He said partners

looking to build or integrate a

vendor-neutral storage stack

to sell as-a-service and land

clients in a neutral place will

be the most successful.

“Co-location datacentres

are the key, they are the

landlords of where the

data will sit. They can give

the client an independent

third party to hold data and

facilitate movement in and

out of the Cloud.

“Going forward, the

number one opportunity, will

still be traditional on-premise

infrastructure because most

businesses will not go all in

on Cloud.

“Customers are more

interested in the outcome

than what it looks like. What

they are really looking for is a

platform that will fulfill their

requirements for delivery and

that will encourage a shift back

to multi-protocol platforms,”

Byrne claimed.

WITH ALL THE TALK ABOUT FLASH AND THE EXPLOSION

OF CLOUD, CUSTOMERS AND PARTNERS ALIKE SHOULD BE

FORGIVEN IF THEY’RE CONFUSED ON THE WAY FORWARD.

ARN’S CHRIS PLAYER SPOKE TO INDUSTRY LEADERS ON

WHAT ARE SOME MARKET OPPORTUNITIES WITHIN THE

STORAGE SPACE.

Sweeping ahead with storage

STORAGE/MARKETS 49

$US8.51 billionthe expected revenue for storage hardware used for Big Data deployments by 2019- IDC

THE SIZE OF THE DIGITAL UNIVERSE IS FORECASTED TO GROW TO 40,000 EXABYTES BY 2020, AND THIS SORT OF

DATA GROWTH REQUIRES HUGE AMOUNTS OF STORAGE

- IDC AND EMC


50 MARKETS/TELECOMMUNICATIONS

THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS MARKET HAS GROWN TO REACH $41.3 BILLION DOLLARS, ACCORDING TO RESEARCH BY

IBISWORLD. THIS HUGE MARKET IS DOMINATED BY TELSTRA, OPTUS AND VODAFONE, BUT HOW CAN THE CHANNEL BENEFIT

FROM THE VAST TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE THE INDUSTRY HAS EXPERIENCED? CHRIS PLAYER SPOKE TO A NUMBER OF

PLAYERS IN THE TELECOMMUNICATIONS SPACE TO GET THEIR VIEWS.

Telecommunications takes big steps forward in 2016

Keith MastertonTELSTRA DIRECTOR OF BUSINESS AND

ENTERPRISE PARTNERS

Masterton said the key to

success, for the channel, would

be developing business

solutions that leverage

technological improvements.

“We see the move toward

professional and managed

services as a key capability.

We want partners that

have business consultancy

skills and application

and services skills,”

he added.

Masterton described

Telstra’s mobile network

capability as an enabler for

its channel and that the telco

would continue development in

the area to service this need.

“We will continue to

invest in leadership in

that area. We see it as a

positive differentiator for our

channel partners to take to

their customers.

He added that the telco was

seeing many of its partners

morph their businesses to

become solutions integrators.

“We are looking to

transition and migrate our

existing channel but also

looking for new partners with

those skills to compliment our

existing capability.”

Frank SkiffingtonMITEL A/NZ VICE-PRESIDENT

Skiffington said 2016 was about

working more collaboratively in

the mobile space.

“There is a big push from the

partners and telco carriers to

fold in mobile to whatever other

solutions they are offering as

part of their managed services

proposition,” he said.

“I don’t think it is going to

change the market dramatically,

what it will do is allow the

market to address an area that

has really been the preserves

of the mobile carriers.

“There are plenty of

vendors out there talking about

hosted PBX solutions. What

we are talking about is hosted

unified comms in the mobile

world. We are talking to tier

one carriers about it right now

and it is resonating really well.

“There is a big play for

a traditional telco reseller

channel partner to understand

that they can sell not just the

UC but integrate network,

mobile, other managed service

products into the proposition.

“We are seeing a drive from

some of our bigger channel

partners to become more of a

mini system integrator. Which

is a big change in the market

for them,” he added.

Barry AssafNEXON DIRECTOR

Assaf believes the coming year

would be all about Cloud

enabled UC, contact centre and

relationship management

through the capabilities of

video conferencing.

“Every conversation we

have is about high speed

communications networks and

mobility, particularly around

4G and wireless technology,

autonomous devices, public

and private Cloud services,”

he explained.

“I think the carriers

are going to become more

innovative with the ways they

offer their services such as

Telstra integrating Wi-Fi

networks into its network. It will

become about getting greater

connectivity wherever you go.

“Getting those customers

closer to those networks in our

environment and giving them

access to security, applications,

platforms, and network

services is our focus. You need

to take advantage of some of

these evolving technologies

and be able to leverage those

investments,” he said.

Dean Hodgson ENGHOUSE INTERACTIVE A/NZ

GENERAL MANAGER

Hodgson said IoT and the

connection of devices would be

a big opportunity as the

dynamics of managing those

connections is where the

channel could capitalise on.

“The big role for the

channel is managing all of the

different Clouds an organisation

will use. Each interaction

typically has its own Cloud

environment and all of those

need to be managed,” he added.

“One of the big challenges

for the reseller is dealing with

the many different types of

agreements that come with all

the different Clouds.

“A reseller doesn’t just

sell Cloud or on-premises or

just software; they sell a mix,

especially to enterprise. These

enterprises have a number of

different commercial models of

how it wants to transact.

“Customers are saying they

want to pay per endpoint per

month, or per agent per year.

The challenge for the resellers

is how they are able to manage

those deal variants,” he said.

$ 41.3 BILLIONTHE OVERALL SUBDIVISION REVENUE EXPECTED OVER THE FIVE YEARS

THROUGH 2015-16. - IBISWorld

49.6% mobile services; 24.9% wired services; 22.4% resold telecommunications; 3.1% satellite, TV, and other services

PRODUCTS AND SERVICES SEGMENTATION (2015-16), IBISWorld


ACQUISITIONS 51

endpoint security and user profile

management vendor, AppSense. Financial

terms of the deal haven't been disclosed.

This is the seventh acquisition for

LANDesk in five years and will expand

its capabilities in unified endpoint

management to include both physical and

virtual devices. AppSense will also add

advanced endpoint protection capabilities

to the product portfolio. – JULIA TALEVSKI

Kogan.com buys Dick Smith online retail businessOnline retailer, Kogan.com has purchased

the Dick Smith online retail business, and

will take over from June 1. Kogan plans to

keep the legacy of the Dick Smith brand

and run it as an online-only consumer

electronics retailer. – JULIA TALEVSKI

SugarCRM acquires Contastic NLP technologySugarCRM has acquired the intellectual

property rights of Contastic, a natural

language processing (NLP) platform

designed to automatically recommend

valuable content for users to send to

their contacts. Following the acquisition,

Contastic chief executive, Cy Khormaee

joined SugarCRM as director of product

management for predictive analytics.

– HOLLY MORGAN

BroadSoft picks up TranseraUnified communications and collaboration

services company, BroadSoft, has

acquired Transera, a provider of Cloud-

based contact center software for SMB

and large enterprises. BroadSoft said

the acquisition positions the company to

lead the fast-growing Contact Center-

as-a-Service (CCaaS) market, while

enabling service providers to offer a

comprehensive Cloud contact center

portfolio with minimal new investments,

Shoply to acquire 100 per cent of Anyware Technologies in mergerOnline retailer, Shoply, will acquire 100 per

cent of distie, Anyware Technologies, in

merger plans announced in a filing on the ASX.

Under terms of the agreement,

Anyware Technologies managing director,

Garrison Huang, will inject $1 million to

Shoply through an entity he controls giving

Anyware a 19.99 per cent share of the total

issued capital of Shoply, initially.

Anyware Technologies also includes

e-commerce business, Harris Technology,

which it acquired from Wesfarmers.

Projected revenue of the two merged

companies for FY2016 is $50 million.

Shoply includes the two companies,

eStore and Warcom, both electronics

retailers. Combined with Harris Technology

they will deliver larger scale and greater

synergy, according Huang in a statement

to ARN.

It was subsequently announced that

ShoplyEO, Vaughan Clark, will retire from the

business and Huang has been appointed as

the managing director of the group, starting

after the merger is completed in May.

– MIKE GEE

CSC acquires Canberra's Dalmatian GroupIT services provider CSC has added

another acquisition to its arsenal,

purchasing Canberra-based information

and cyber security consultants, Dalmatian

Group. Financial details of the acquisition

haven't been disclosed. CSC A/NZ

managing director, Seelan Nayagam, said

the demand for cyber security services is

growing across its enterprise accounts,

and the acquisition substantially expands

its presence in this sector across A/NZ.

– JULIA TALEVSKI

LANdesk picks up AppSenseUS-based LANDesk has added to its

portfolio through its acquisition of

Bought: the acquisitions round-up

ACQUIRED 01/02/16 - 21/03/16• Anyware Technologies• Dalmation Group• AppSense• Dick Smith (online

retail)

• Contastic NLP• Transera• Capital Markets• TwoCents Group• Connector Systems

Fast facts

rapid time-to-market, and seamless

integration with BroadSoft’s BroadWorks

and BroadCloud solutions. – HAFIZAH OSMAN

Computershare adds Capital MarketsSoftware solutions and professional

services company, Computershare

(ASX:CPU), has acquired US-based

funding, cooperative and risk and

analytics services company, Capital

Markets Cooperative (CMC). The company

said the acquisition is subject to US

regulatory approvals, which are expected

to be obtained within three months. The

total acquisition is worth $US71.2 million.

– HAFIZAH OSMAN

Rype Group buys TwoCents GroupAustralian Cloud integration company,

Rype Group, has acquired marketing

agency, TwoCents Group, as part of its

focused expansion strategy. TwoCents

Group will continue in its current form

as a full-service marketing agency, with

director Samantha Brooks staying on as

CEO and founder Simon Dell taking on a

consulting role with TwoCents as well as a

seat on the Rype board. – HAFIZAH OSMAN

Ingram Micro nabs Connector SystemsIngram Micro has entered into an

agreement to acquire Connector Systems

Limited, a value-added IT solutions

provider, representing emerging and

developing vendors in both Australia and

New Zealand. The acquisition is subject

to certain customary closing conditions

and is expected to close in the 2016 first

quarter. As a result, Connector Systems

will operate as a business unit within

Ingram Micro’s Value Division – with the

price tag remaining private.

– JAMES HENDERSON

Bulletproof acquires Cloud HouseASX-listed Cloud hosting provider,

Bulletproof, has purchased New Zealand

Cloud services company, Cloud House.

The deal is worth $NZ1 million up front,

with the possibility a further $NZ4.2

million to be paid in a 50/50 split of cash

and shares based on performance until

mid-2017. - CHRIS PLAYER

Garrison Huang


52 FEATURE/TECHNOLOGY



Over the past year, I’ve had the opportunity to attend a number of conferences, ranging from the most establishment events you can think of

all the way to highly technical yet informal meetups. The dress at the events ranged from suits and ties to t-shirts and shorts.

During the year, I’ve talked with an enormous range of IT people. Some work at vendors. Some at service providers. I’ve spoken to many analysts, associated from the very largest firms down to one-person shops. And I’ve talked to

well over a hundred IT users, working in large enterprise organizations as well as Web-native startups.

And the universal feeling is that IT is changing in a huge way. And that change is not just in terms of the technology used in IT – though there is incredible change going on there. But also in in the very role of IT.

In short, person after person, no matter their role or their employer, echoed the same message: IT is undergoing a profound transformation. I agree. And here’s my four tenets for the future of the IT industry.

It’s a software-driven, open source world, and we’re just living in it. By Bernard Golden

Four principles that

will shape the future of IT

The four tenets start off with no controversy:

Marc Andreessen’s 2011 Wall Street Journal editorial pointed out that software is transforming entire industry segments, including video entertainment, music, but also old-line industries like transportation, retail, and even defense. His message was that software is now a central component of every industry’s offerings, and every company needed to focus on software as a core competency. And everyone jumped on it.

The phrase “software is eating the world” has become a standard opening slide in many vendor’s decks. More recently, the line “Don’t get Ubered” has joined it, warning audience members that their business could be disrupted by a Silicon Valley (or other IT hot spot) startup that is reconfiguring an industry value chain and being fueled by endless venture capital.

In fact, software is eating the world has become such a trope that it’s trotted out as an easy shorthand

to represent that change is going on – but the endless repetition attenuates the underlying truth: The shift to digitisation is affecting every industry, to the disadvantage of incumbents.

Part of this is the fact that products or processes that used to require significant investment or manual

effort are being replaced by digitised alternatives. More tellingly, small companies, unencumbered by practices required by analog approaches fossilized into inefficient industry traditions, can rethink the customer value chain and redesign it as a more efficient offering.

The key challenge for incumbents is their existing infrastructure and practices, typically developed as a

key part of their differentiation and competitive advantage, are now shackles constricting their ability to respond to the software revolution.

What we will see over the next decade is akin to the revolution wrought by the emergence of assembly line mass production. Any company

that wanted to serve a mass market had to figure out how to automate production; those that couldn’t, or couldn’t raise enough capital to fund the effort dwindled away.

What is different today is that this software-centric reality will affect every industry and every company. Most are unprepared, and many will fail to make the leap to being a software company.

Software is eating the world

1

Any company that wanted to serve a mass market had to figure out how to automate production; those

that couldn’t, or couldn’t raise enough capital to fund the effort dwindled away.


TECHNOLOGY/FEATURE 53


TECHNOLOGY/FEATURE 53

Within the overall wrenching

restructuring of the economy, it’s easy to overlook the massive change going in the technology industry itself. The shift to a software-centric world should redound to the immense benefit of the big technology firms, but they’re in trouble, too. Instead of reaping the gain of everyone else being forced to focus on technology, big vendors are themselves suffering from the ongoing shift to software.

The evidence is everywhere: IBM has suffered 15 straight quarters of reduced revenues. Dell and EMC are set for a merger (consolidation is a classic response to an industry in financial trouble). BMC and Informatica have gone through private equity restructurings (another classic response to poor prospects).

So why is what should be a field of dreams for technology companies turning into a nightmare? The answer is two little words: open source. Simply put, open source is commoditising

the vendor offerings, and vendors are suffering from cost structures misaligned with the new realities of the industry.

Not only does this directly affect software products, but it also affects hardware (remember, software is eating the world, and that extends to hardware as well). The new mantra is software-defined anything, and by placing open source into commodity hardware, previously-unassailable market positions are now showing reduced growth and even profit drops.

Open source is proving to be more than a low-cost replacement, however. Technology innovation has shifted decisively to open source. It’s hard to think of an emerging technology area that isn’t based on open source. Obviously, the software-defined hardware trends reflects this.

The open source trend means more than incumbent vendor financial pain. It means that the ongoing industrial restructuring I described in the previous section of this piece will be achieved via the use of open source, which brings us to my third tenet.

Netflix is an awesome company.

Given how early and effectively it dismantled the video rental company Blockbuster, we should perhaps speak of the “Netflixization of an industry” rather than give that epithet to Uber. And it hasn’t rested on its laurels, either. It no sooner became top dog in the rental industry than it shifted to video streaming, where it appears about ready to upend the existing studio/carrier ecosystem.

At its heart, Netflix is a technology company. And it’s awesome there as well. Early in its streaming journey, Netflix concluded that operating

datacentres is not its forte; moreover, given its uncertain growth and erratic viewer patterns, trying to manage infrastructure would be an intractable headache. So it turned to Amazon Web Services, and used it as the basis for its widely-used streaming service..

Instead of managing infrastructure, Netflix focused on building out its streaming application capability. And it built far more than just application functionality. Netflix created supporting functionality appropriate to deploying and monitoring vast numbers of AWS resources in an environment that often experiences failure. It built orchestration tooling

to allow application components to continuously join and leave the resource pool. It built complementary tools to perform destructive testing to better ensure resiliency.

In other words, Netflix designed an incredibly sophisticated software environment tuned for its needs, and invested heavily to implement it. And it did all this with open source, much of which it created and then released to the larger world to allow others to use Netflix tools.

Here’s the thing, though. Netflix is sui generis, and has capabilities far beyond the average or even top-notch enterprise IT organization. Netflix focuses on its IT capabilities as a core

No enterprise is Netflix … or ever will be

Open source is eating the technology industry

3

21. “This software-centric reality will affect every

industry and every company. Most are unprepared,

and many will fail to make the leap to being a

software company.”

2. “The open source trend means more than

incumbent vendor financial pain. It means that the

ongoing industrial restructuring will be achieved via

the use of open source.”

3. “Whatever solution arrives to help enterprise IT

organizations meet their future, it’s not going to occur

by aping Netflix.”

4. “Everyone will be walking on constantly shifting

sands as the siroccos of innovation and disruption

blow through the industry.”

THE REVOLUTION STARTS HERE





There’s an almost perfect storm engulfing enterprise IT organisations. Their charter is

rapidly moving from internal process automation to creating new business offerings to help their companies remain competitive. The stalwarts of technology vendors are unlikely to be capable of helping them achieve this, because their own prospects are being buffeted by the innovation and economics of open source. Meanwhile, emulating the best open source-using organizations like Netflix seems beyond their grasp. So where will their solutions come from?

Almost certainly, new open source offerings will arrive that combine important components into preconfigured stacks that can be implemented as-is, thereby reducing the competence required to use them. I know that not all open source communities have covered themselves in glory on this issue, but the pressure – and opportunity – to make open source more consumable will provide powerful incentives for creation of these offerings.

Second, one can expect a new breed of vendor to spring up to offer help to enterprises with innovative open source projects. This new breed is likely to combine consultancy and training and many will also offer managed services to offload operational burden from users.

Third, we are likely to see interesting consortia spring up to provide best practices and reference architectures, with participation from both vendors and end users. Both have an interest in making open source more consumable, and working together can ensure both provider and user can contribute and benefit from collaboration.

One can envisage tremendous disarray in the vendor space as incumbents try to retool themselves to meet the emerging needs of enterprise customers. There will be a flood of new entrants who will all be honing their “product/market fit” in the throes of a rapidly changing industry landscape. Old and new will be jousting to serve as the primary interface to customers because the entity that “owns the customer” always obtains the lion’s share of the revenue. One can anticipate a lengthy period of vicious natural selection as the new ecosystem participants go up against existing inhabitants in a battle for critical resources: customer budgets.

Likewise, enterprise IT organisations will go through extended disruption as they attempt to develop skills more suitable to their new role as the technology factory of their companies. The organizational strife implicit in Gartner’s bi-modal IT will play out in full force as IT groups try to build new capabilities and circumscribe investment in legacy systems. The rapid technology innovation we will witness over the next decade will make this process even more difficult, as it will be challenging, to say the least, to determine exactly how to make a plan in such a dynamic environment.

Making such an enormous change across the entire technology landscape will be a protracted effort. Everyone will be walking on constantly shifting sands as the siroccos of innovation and disruption blow through the industry. But on the other side of the chaos lies a new kind of industrial organization, one powered by open source software and delivering its value via digital technology.

Helping enterprises becoming software

companies via open source is the next

decade’s IT challenge … and opportunity

competence and invests as much as is needed, facilitated by its software-like margins. It also attracts some of the best talent in the industry, drawn by the challenge of working on the Netflix technology, and a set of HR principles unique unto Netflix. Oh, and it pays really well, and offers options in its high-flying stock.

None of this sounds like a typical enterprise IT organisation to me, and I doubt it does to you, either. Despite the best intentions, the average enterprise IT organisation doesn’t have the money to attract high-quality talent. It’s

unlikely to be capable of designing its own application environment. Even trying to leverage the Netflix tools is likely to be beyond its capabilities, because the tools require top talent to adapt and operate them for a company’s own environment.

Consequently, exhorting enterprise IT organisations to “be like Netflix” is like encouraging me to run like Usain Bolt. It’s not going to happen. Whatever solution arrives to help enterprise IT organizations meet their future, it’s not going to occur by aping Netflix. Convenient, this leads directly to my fourth tenet on the future of IT.

4

Person after person, no matter their role or

their employer, echoed the same message:

IT is undergoing a profound transformation.

Exhorting enterprise IT organisations to

“be like Netflix” is like encouraging me to run like Usain Bolt. It’s not

going to happen.

CORE MESSAGE

FASTER. SAFER. MORE PROFITABLE.Find out about becoming an ESET partner at eset.com/au

INTERNET SECURITY WITHOUT COMPROMISETM FOR YOU AND YOUR CUSTOMERS


56 THE WORKPLACE

Employee misconduct: Handling the situation

C an you dismiss an employee

because of the way he or

she behaved at a company

function? It is not that simple

particularly if you (as an employer)

have hosted a function that enables

and facilitates the employee to

behave badly.

In January 2016, the Fair

Work Commission handed a

decision regarding an employee’s

misconduct at a staff Christmas

party, which is a good reminder

for us all about what is acceptable

behaviour at work functions.

The case was McDaid v Future

Engineering and Communication

[2016] FWC 343. The employer,

Future Engineering and

Communication (FEC) dismissed

McDaid after his misconduct at

the 2014 FEC Christmas party.

The FEC Christmas party had

unlimited alcohol and there were

no controls over the amount

employees consumed.

McDaid, a project manager, got

drunk and became physically and

verbally aggressive. He poked and

pushed a senior engineer several

times before finally pushing him

into a swimming pool, fully clothed.

McDaid was asked to leave the

party by the general manager,

who he later got into a fight with

and injured.

In January 2015, McDaid was

called into work for a meeting. At

the meeting, he was told to find a

new job by the end of the month

but no mention was made of his

conduct at the Christmas party.

McDaid then went on sick

leave. When he returned, two

months later, from continuous sick

leave, he was asked to explain his

actions at the FEC Christmas party

(namely his misconduct). A support

person was present at this meeting

and they confirmed that McDaid

was given every opportunity to

explain his misconduct.

McDaid’s responses were

found to be unsatisfactory by

FEC and his employment was

terminated at the end of that

meeting, effective immediately.

McDaid appealed his dismissal

with the Commission. He alleged

that FEC was responsible for his

misconduct. He claimed that FEC

was responsible for supplying him

with unlimited alcohol and not

imposing any controls over how

much he could drink.

The Fair Work Commissioner

upheld the employer’s decision to

terminate McDaid’s employment

and found the dismissal was not

harsh, unjust or unreasonable.

However, the Commissioner went

on to say that:

1 in some cases employers

providing alcohol may be

liable for events attributable to its

consumption;

2 employees who drink will also

be held responsible for their

own actions, particularly where

there is physical violence.

Key takeaway

So, while an employee who gets drunk can’t pardon himself or herself from all responsibility for the consequences of his or her own actions, especially in circumstances where they engage in physical violence, an employer who provides free

flowing alcohol at a work function, and takes no steps to ensure responsible consumption, may not always escape responsibility for an inebriated employee’s actions.Your next work function might seem like it is months

away, but it is the perfect time for you to ensure that you have appropriate policies in place setting out the limits of acceptable behaviour for staff at work functions and other social events.

Having a pool party as your next work function? Make sure you encourage good behaviour and responsible drinking. By Madhu Dubey

Madhu Dubey is a partner

at Integrated Legal which

specialises in providing

cost effective legal

services to the technology

industry. She is also Guest

Academic at Australian

National University.

An employer who provides free flowing alcohol at a work function, and takes no steps to ensure responsible consumption, may not always escape responsibility for an inebriated employee's actions.


58 PRODUCTS

W eighing in at 157 grams

and measuring 150.9 x

72.6 x 7.7mm, the unit is

slightly larger and heavier than its

major competitor, Apple’s iPhone

6s. It does pack more features than

the Apple though, with Samsung’s

fast Exynos 8890 CPU, an amazing

camera, water resistance capability

and an impressive battery life.

Samsung claims it has been

listening to consumers over last 12

months, and those pain points have

been taken into consideration in

the make of the S7 Edge. We found

that the S7 Edge is definitely an

improvement on its predecessor,

the S6 Edge. The return of water

resistance and MicroSD cards are

the main evidence of this. Overall,

the look of the device is more of an

evolution than a revolution and the

new phone feels better in the hand

than the model it supersedes.

Samsung has even improved the

camera. With a bright f/1.7 aperture

(one of the lowest on the market),

we were certainly not disappointed

by the results which are best

demonstrated by the incredible

contrast from the pictures.

It comes with 4GB of RAM and

this allows the S7 Edge to move

seamlessly between apps, the home

page and the Edge screen.

BATTERY LIFE One of the standout features of the S7

Edge is its battery life. The S6 range

was criticised for this and Samsung

Samsung has made a big push for its Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge to be the new go to device for the chic, stylish and tech savvy individual. The unit is a stunning thing - beautifully designed with great lines and bevelled edges. It looks the part, but can it sing like a diva or just look like one? CHRIS PLAYER reports.

Living on the Edge?

has upped the ante significantly to the

point that we got close to three full

days of regular use out of the device.

This was both a blessing and a curse

as we repeatedly forgot to charge

the device and were caught out on a

couple of occasions.

The S7 Edge also stays reasonably

cool during heavy usage such as

mobile gaming due to its liquid

cooling function. This means you

can use it for long periods and

never feel discomfort.

DISPLAYSamsung has a good reputation for

producing some of the best screens

on the market in its flagship devices,

and the S7 Edge is no exception. The

display is vibrant and bright at even

acute viewing angles, which we liked

but it did raise concerns about how

clearly people in close proximity

could view our content.

Samsung has also taken a leaf

from the smartwatch book with an

Always On display so you can view the

time date and even see if you have

new messages or emails at a glance.

The feature uses the power

properties of the display, allowing the

phone to light up only those pixels it

needs to display something on the

screen. This means that instead of

lighting up a backlight and powering

all 3.6 million pixels to show you

the time, the S7 Edge can light up a

selection of those pixels to display

simple things on the display without

really affecting your battery life.

THE IRRITATIONSNow we come to the annoying bit,

and it’s a big one. The display is

beautiful yes, and sensitive to a fault.

The features of the S7 Edge screen

mean that when using the keyboard,

you continually and accidentally hit

keys with the edge of your palm. This

makes for some interesting, and at

times disastrous messages.

After discussing this issue with

other S7 Edge users, many of them

admitted that they had altered their

method of using the keyboard after

switching to the device.

Quick ripSleek, stylish and at times infuriating. Overall, the look of the device is more of an evolution than a revolution. The display is beautiful yes, and sensitive to a fault. The features of the S7 Edge screen mean that when using the keyboard, you continually hit keys with the edge of your palm. However, the S7 Edge is definitely an improvement on its predecessor, the S6 Edge.

The verdictThe S7 Edge is a brilliant device but until Samsung come up with a fix for the screen, it will not attract the market share the manufacturer is after. There is no point in all the technology gone into creating this phone when it disrupts everyday tasks.

Fast factsThe product: Samsung Galaxy S7 EdgeThe price: $1249The wow factor: 3.5 stars


PRODUCTS 59

Fast factsThe product: BackBeat PRO+The price: $419The wow factor: 4.5 stars

W eighing in at around 340

grams, the PRO+ can

be used as a wired or

wireless headset which you can

connect to your mobile device via

Bluetooth or to your PC via the

wireless USB adaptor.

The headphones are very

comfortable even during extended

periods of listening. The over ear

design does a fairly good job of

cancelling out outside noise but for

the full effect you need to switch on

the noise-canceling feature.

The unit also has an OpenMic

feature lets you hear your

surroundings and the PRO+ come

equipped with the best feature

of Plantronics, the automatic

music play/pause feature that will

pause content when you take the

headphones off and play when you

put them back on. The range on

the headphones is pretty good too.

Plantronics says they will work up

to 100 meters from the device you

are playing back from, but this is

clearly meant to be without physical

obstruction. We found that 25 meters

was about the limit when moving

between rooms.

We loved using these headphones

in the office and especially on

the plane as they cut out almost

all background noise and let you

immerse yourself in your audio.

They sound great as well which is

something we have come to expect

from Plantronics. They did well

in our vinyl test, Beast of Burden

by The Rolling Stones sounded

beautifully crisp and balanced with

great representation of low, mid and

high range.

The verdictThe PRO+ is the perfect companion for the mobile audiophile. Though not as sleek in appearance as some competitors, it packs plenty of features for the $419 asking price.

The design is simple yet elegant and follows a

pattern we have come to expect from Lenovo. There

was some debate in the office as to whether it looked too plain but

most were impressed by the look and feel of the unit and we like that

Lenovo has not gone the way of many competitors and simply made it

look like an Apple notebook.

It’s powered by an Intel core i7-5600U processor running at

2.60GHz (Turbo Boost to 3.2GHz) with 8GB of ram and a 256GB solid

state hard drive. Like many of the lightweight premium laptops on

the market it is running integrated graphics. While we would have

liked to see dedicated graphics in a machine in this price range, the

X1 was up to the task for most applications.

The Ultrabook comes with a 14-inch 2560x1440 display that is

touch enabled. It looks great with excellent colour representation

and a wide array of viewing angles. It weighs in at around 1.44 Kg,

which makes it extremely portable and the sim card slot makes it

ideal for working on the go. Also included is the fingerprint reader

for security.

The battery life is impressive as well, we were able to get almost

nine hours out of it in our battery test. Also included are all the

features you would expect from Laptop of this caliber, 802.11AC

Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, microSD slot and a variety of ports to connect

to a monitor or external storage. -Chris Player

The verdictIf you are looking for a laptop that is big on power and features yet light on weight, it is hard to go past the X1 Carbon. The combination of looks, internal grunt and functionality made it a joy to use. While the asking price is a bit too close to $3000 for our liking, Lenovo does the occasional deal through its website so be sure to check it out to see if you can get a better deal.

High fidelity on the moveIf you are in the market for a pair of high-end bluetooth headphones that you can easily connect to your PC, then the BackBeat PRO+ from Plantronics may be just what you need. CHRIS PLAYER reports.

The perfect business companionThe X1 carbon is a simple yet powerful laptop packed with features which make it perfect for the mobile workforce.

simple yet elegant and follows a

workforce.

Fast factsThe product: Lenovo X1 Carbon The price: $2899The wow factor: 4.5 stars


60 APPS

Predictor:Is a new app from marketing

software company, Bronto,

which lets commerce marketers

send targeted product

recommendations to specific

segments of subscribers using

product data stored in Bronto’s

marketing platform. It integrates

with Google Merchant product

feed and lets you recommend sale

items to low order customers and

premium products to big spenders.

eFax:The eFax iPad app makes it

easy to send and receive faxes

from a tablet. The app has

sacrificed little in the transition

from desktop to mobile app. A

free account lets you receive

(not send) a handful of faxes,

but upgrading to a Plus or Pro

account give full functionality

to send and receive faxes.

Browse Recovery:Bronto has also made a Browse

Recovery app which captures

shoppers activity on an

ecommerce site. The app can

also send automated, relevant

messages based on rules, such

as recently viewed products,

frequently viewed categories or

frequently viewed products. The

app captures and stores product

page browse activity for all

customers and ties that behaviour

to a known contact or saves the

browse activity so it can be later

matched to a known contact.

Cubby:The newest app from the

team at LogMeIn allows

individuals, teams and entire

workplaces to easily and

securely work together from

any location. Files are stored

in the cloud for anywhere

access, shared with others

publicly or privately, or even

directly synced between

devices without using the

cloud. And to keep company

data secure, Cubby helps

IT easily manage users,

policies and devices from one

central location.

Network Toolbox:Ever wanted to turn your iOS

device into a network toolbox?

Well now you can with the

appropriately named Network

Toolbox app. It comes packed with

many cool networking utilities but

also looks great which will please

the Apple folks enormously.

Apple goes on an open source health kick

A pple’s open source

ResearchKit

framework uses data

from iPhones to help doctors

gain better health data directly

from patients.

Apple said medical

researchers are adopting

these new features to

design targeted studies for

diseases and conditions

that affect billions of

people around the world

and to gather more

specific types of data

from participants.

ResearchKit turns

iPhone into a tool for

medical research by helping

doctors, scientists and other

researchers gather data

more frequently and more

accurately from participants

using iPhone apps.

Participants enrolled in

these app-based studies can

review an interactive informed

consent process, complete

active tasks or submit survey

responses, and choose how

their health data is shared

with researchers.

The key to the technology

is the open source platform

on which it runs. Apple has a

well documented history of

a ‘closed loop’ system, not

allowing any third parties

access to its code, but the

iPhone and specifically the

App store has changed this.

With the open source

model, Apple has let

developers design studies

for iPhone and build on the

available software code and

contribute their tasks back to

the community to help other

researchers do more with

the framework.

The newest module,

designed by 23andMe and

recently released to the

open source community, lets

researchers incorporate

genetic data into studies.

The platform is currently

being used to assist

researchers in the fields

of postnatal depression,

cardiovascular disease and

asthma. Key contributions

include the ability to study tone

audiometry; measure reaction

time through delivery of a

known stimulus to a known

response; assess the speed

of information processing

and working memory; use the

mathematical puzzle Tower

of Hanoi for cognition studies;

and conduct a timed walk test.

ResearchKit studies

are underway in Australia,

Austria, China, Germany,

Hong Kong, Ireland, Japan,

Netherlands, Switzerland,

the UK and the US.

- Chris Player

The apps

Cubby helps IT easily manage users, policies and devices from one central location.


WIICTA ALUMNI/COMMUNITY 61


ARN’s Inaugural WIICTA AlumniThe inaugural WIICTA Alumni 2016 breakfast, held at the Establishment in Sydney, brought together finalists to meet with previous winners and female Hall of Fame members. The aim of the program was to facilitate a mentoring-style program to support women working in the technology sector. Conversations revolved around climbing the corporate ladder,the importance of a personal development plan, and confidence.Photos by Maria Stefina.

1. Panel discussion 2. Sara Adams (Telstra) 3. Katy Garcia (IBM), Fiona Brown (Dicker Data) 4. Sue Armstrong (Fujitsu) 5. Kate Burleigh (Intel) 6. Rhody Burton (IBM), Gabrielle Kingston (AppSense), Aggie Szemplinska (PernixData), Simran Kaur (Webroot) 7. Mona Lolas (IR), Dawn Edmonds (rhipe), Sara Adams (Telstra) 8. Ashlee McCusker (AWS), Gabrielle Kingston (AppSense), Amy Christopher (Symantec), Kate Burleigh (Intel), Wendy O’Keeffe (Westcon Comstor), Susan Searle (ARN) 9. Aggie Szemplinska (PernixData), Susan Searle (ARN), Genevieve White (Fortinet), Michelle Dawson (Kaseya) 10. Carol McLoughlin (Fujitsu), Sophie Vigors (DC), Sue Armstrong (Fujitsu) 11. Therese Fletcher (SAP), Gemma Lloyd (DCC)

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EMERGING LEADERSARN | 2016

E V E N T

Are YOU an emerging

leader in the ICT industry?

w w w . a r n n e t . c o m . a u / e m e r g i n g l e a d e r s

WHO IS AN EMERGING LEADER?

NOMINATIONS NOW OPEN

NOMINATE NOW


64 COMMUNITY/JUDGES’ LUNCH

Awards open with Judges’ LunchThe traditional kick-off to the ARN ICT Industry Awards, the ARN Judges’ Networking Lunch, was held in the Ballroom at the Ivy in Sydney. More than 100 IT industry leaders gathered to hear an outstanding address by ARN Hall of Fame inductee and senior vice-president and managing director of Insight Enterprises Asia-Pacific, Andrea Della Mattea, who spoke about doing business in China. The gathering was also addressed by ARN president and publisher, Susan Searle, ARN associate editor, Jennifer O’Brien, and ARN editor, James Hutchinson. Photos by Mike Gee.

DATES TO REMEMBER

24/05/2016Nominations for the 2016 ARN ICT Industry Awards open

24/06/2016Nominations close

15/09/2016Celebration Dinner at Four Points by Sheraton Sydney

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JUDGES’ LUNCH/COMMUNITY 65

1. Robbie Upcroft (Webroot), Martin Christmas (Arrow), Chris Barton (FireEye). 2. Karl Sice (Staples), Aaron McLeod (Staples), Nick Stranks (Ethan Group) 3. Steve Martin (NEXTDC), Ronnie Altit (Insentra), David Gage (ARN Hall of Fame), George Kazangi (Blue Central) 4. Photo bombed: Janice Tong (ARN) and Ben Johnson (Dicker Data) by David Abouhaidar (AC3) 5. Scott Frew (iAsset.com) and Andrew Thomas (Thomas Duryea) 6. Jacques Tesson (DPSA). 7. Duncan Bennet, Rhody Burton (IBM) 8. Kerrie-Anne Turner (VMware), Susan Searle (ARN), Sia Kelly (Telstra) 9. Laurie Sellers (ARN Hall of Fame), Andrea Della Mattea (ARN Hall of Fame and Insight) 10. Networking 11. ARN Hall of Fame inductees Andrew Thomas (Thomas Duryea) and Allan King (Buttonwood) 12. Phil Cameron (ARN Hall of Fame and Westcon Comstor), Laurie Sellers (ARN Hall of Fame)

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