Westcon senior vice president of global partner management, Ken Bast; Comstor executive vice president, solutions development and strategy, Steve Garrou; Wescon chief executive, Dolph Westerbos; Cisco vice president worldwide distribution sales, Julie Hens; Westcon-Comstor executive vice president, Wendy O'Keeffe; Westcon managing director A/NZ, Dave Rosenberg; and Cisco director partner business, Jason Brouwers
Westcon’s dedicated Cisco shop, Comstor, has launched in Australia.
Westcon chief executive, Dolph Westerbos, said the move is designed to consolidate the distributor’s Cisco offerings under one roof and the company aims to build on the global brand Comstor has established over the past 10 years.
“Comstor is one of two go-to-market brands within Westcon-Comstor and is well established globally as a dedicated Cisco business unit. Therefore, it makes sense to now also unite Cisco’s products under the Comstor brand in A/NZ to make it easier for solution providers to buy and sell Cisco,” he said.
“We have had a very strong, 20-year partnership with Cisco globally, but the A/NZ business has been the exception within the organisation. It has been the one part of our company where we haven’t gone to market with a dedicated Cisco business unit.
“We are fixing that now and I think it will bring a lot of value to our partnership and also to the partners in the local market.”
Australia is one of the last markets in Westcon’s 130 country network to experience the distributor’s dedicated Cisco business.
The Comstor brand was launched in New Zealand in August and Westcon managing director for A/NZ, Dave Rosenberg, said the early New Zealand experience had given the company great confidence that the Australian operation would be a success.
“What we have done exceptionally well in New Zealand is resource the business really well, gone to market successfully and our first month of trading has been immensely successful for both us and Cisco,” he said.
“You will see us drive a differentiation in both markets going forward. We will be driving heavily into the architectural pillar play and making sure that we are adding as much value as possible for our partners.”
Rosenberg said the Comstor point of difference goes beyond its dedicated Cisco offerings.
“The offerings we have, the methodologies we bring to the market, and our EDGE program brings a unique opportunity for partners that are looking to grow with the Cisco business where we can help and add value to that."
The EDGE program is a partner development program the company created in conjunction with Cisco.
Comstor has 40 dedicated staff across the A/NZ market, 30 of which are based in Australia. The distributor is currently on a recruiting drive and is looking for a head of the Comstor business in the A/NZ region. Once appointed, they will report directly to Rosenberg.
“There will be consolidated roles across the backend in finance and logistics as you would expect, and we have a group of dedicated Cisco business development managers that will fit into the the Comstor business. Some of our partner management will sit across Westcon and Comstor, “ Rosenberg added.
Cisco has pledged a considerable amount of resource to the initiative. Cisco director partner business group A/NZ, Jason Brouwers, said the great thing about the relationship with Comstor was the focus and planning.
“The relationships we have on the ground we can work on together and that will lead to commercial success. We are very hopeful and quite bullish about our prospects for growth with the venture,” he said.
Cisco vice-president, worldwide distribution sales, Julie Hens, added that, for Westcon, consolidating its Cisco distribution operations in Australia under the Comstor brand creates a stronger single entity that aligns resources and expertise around Cisco solutions and opens up even more opportunities for partners.
“Comstor provides us global scale operating in well over 100 countries, and represents the largest single Cisco dedicated distributor focused on helping our partners with value added services, enablement and solution delivery,” Hens said.
