ARN

ARN Innovation Awards 2022: and the winners are....

Celebrated during a black-tie event at ICC Sydney on 15 September that brought together more than 700 members of Australia’s channel community.

ARN is proud to reveal the winners of Innovation Awards in 2022, featuring a leading and diverse line-up of partners, vendors, distributors and individuals across Australia.

Celebrated during a black-tie event at ICC Sydney on 15 September that brought together more than 700 members of Australia’s channel community, this year’s Innovation Awards celebrated the accomplishments of more than 39 winners and a new inductee into the ARN Hall of Fame – Tara Ridley.

The winners were selected from 354 finalists (including 120+ individuals) which made the shortlist from a pool of over 200 organisations and more than 480 nominations, spanning partner, start-up, telco, vendor and distributor businesses.

Aligned to the ARN approach of representing established and emerging technology providers in equal measure, the Innovation Awards program in 2022 stands tall as the leading forum for setting the industry benchmark for ecosystem excellence across Australia.

“This is an impressive line-up of business and individual excellence across the channel and we are proud to recognise and celebrate such achievements,” said Cherry Yumul, Vice President of Channel across Asia Pacific at Foundry.

“The success stories behind these awards are testament to how adept the technology industry is at turning challenges into opportunities and how as a community we come together to do good. Congratulations from ARN.”

In 2022, Innovation Awards honoured the channel across eight categories, spanning Partner Innovation, Tech Innovation, Australia-wide Innovation, Start-up Innovation, Personal Innovation, Vendor Innovation, Distributor Innovation and Hall of Fame.

The ARN shortlist panel consisted of Cherry Yumul (Vice President of Channel), James Henderson (Editorial Director), Julia Talevski (Editor), Shirin Robert (Community Editor) and Claudia Muldrew (Associate Editor) with the aim of providing a foundation upon which a broader range of exceptional companies can be recognised.

In addition to honouring winners, ARN also holds wider responsibility for ensuring as many credible technology providers are endorsed through this unique awards program, aligned to the collective goal of providing a platform upon which the ecosystem can shine across Australia.

Winners were selected by an executive judging panel of business leaders from partner, vendor and distributor organisations.

ARN congratulates all winners, highly commended and finalists and thanks a judging panel comprising many of the industry’s leading influencers.

PARTNER INNOVATION

Partner Innovation recognises customer innovation and excellence across the key market segments of Enterprise, Mid-Market and SMB, in addition to pioneering technology specialists and collaborative providers.

Enterprise:

  • APCD
  • Araza
  • ASI Solutions
  • BluBiz Solutions
  • Brennan 
  • Cevo
  • Data#3
  • Global Storage
  • InfoTrust
  • Insight
  • Nexion Networks

Highly Commended: ASI Solutions

Winner: Data#3

Data#3's value offering was strong in FY22, with it delivering value to over 5,000 enterprise customers across both private and public sectors extending their business and technology teams, to deliver growth. Data#3 continued to develop and further invest into its customer success expertise, driving sales strategy and performance.  

Mid-Market:

  • Advanced Mobile IT
  • ASI Solutions
  • Australian Sentinel
  • BluBiz Solutions
  • blueAPACHE
  • Brennan 
  • Dynamic Aspect
  • InfoTrust
  • Macquarie Telecom
  • Oreta
  • Somerville
  • Stax
  • Tecala Group
  • TechForce Services
  • The Missing Link

Winner: blueAPACHE  
 
BlueAPACHE is rapidly capitalising on changing economic conditions and new opportunities by bringing a ‘pay-as-you-grow' model for technology and telecommunications adoption. The IT service provider is committed to delivering solutions with greater automation, lower overall total cost of ownership and improved time to value.  

SMB:

  • A1 Technologies
  • Cevo
  • Delta Insights
  • Dynamic Aspect
  • eNerds
  • Evologic
  • InfoTrust
  • Otto IT
  • Powernet IT Solutions
  • TechForce Services

Highly Commended: InfoTrust

Winner: eNerds

eNerds provides its SMB clients with peace of mind as its primary outcome. It also offers cost containment, systems visibility and business continuity through more than 50 employees. During COVID-19 it helped many SMB businesses work through considerable transformation to cater for hybrid remote or fully remote working requirements. 

Think Differently:

  • Araza
  • Arq Group
  • ASI Solutions
  • Cognizant
  • Otto IT
  • Patient Zero
  • Sekuro
  • TelcoDataCloud
  • The Missing Link

Winner: Sekuro

Operating at the intersection of cyber security and digital transformation, Sekuro developed a unique Zero Trust strategy surpassing the claims of individual vendors to address an organisation’s entire cybersecurity posture including people, identities, endpoints, networks, infrastructure, applications, data and analytics. Operating outside of the traditional bounds of cyber security consulting, Sekuro undertakes a holistic approach from advising on compliance to implementation and sourcing the best talent.

Collaboration:

  • AC3 & Big Village
  • Balance Internet
  • Be Nimble IT
  • DXC Technology & Daisee
  • Dynamic Aspect
  • Ever Nimble
  • Lift Alliance
  • Optus

Winner: AC3/Big Village

AC3 and Big Village win this award for their collaboration to solve a community problem for an Australian government agency. The engagement model was built on mutual respect and a clear understanding of each partners’ technical expertise. The solution was taken to market as a joint venture, working closely to present a united front when engaging with the complex stakeholder group.

TECH INNOVATION

Tech Innovation recognises partners leveraging established and emerging solutions to enhance customer innovation levels, underpinned by deep levels of expertise and specialist services.

Cloud:

  • 8Squad
  • Amblique
  • Arinco
  • Arq Group
  • Consegna
  • DXC Technology
  • Insight
  • Linktech
  • Logicalis
  • oobe
  • Oreta
  • Sourced Group
  • Stax
  • Telstra Purple
  • Versent

Winner: DXC Technology

DXC’s Cloud Right solution framework presents a unique approach to help customers maximise the value from cloud and IT modernisation. This ensures a deep understanding of each customers’ unique strategic, financial, operational, and technical goals enabling the right solution to be deployed at the right time, and on the right platform.

Security:

  • Cevo
  • CSO Group
  • Data#3
  • Exigo Tech
  • Fuse Technology
  • Nueva Solutions
  • Orro Group
  • Outcomex
  • Sekuro
  • Tecala Group

Winner: Orro Group

Through the strategic acquisitions of eSecure and RIOT Solutions, Orro offers a range of managed security and network design solutions to organisations around the country. Securing more than 150 Australian organisations, services include threat detection and incident response, managed security and asset visibility services. Orro offers a collaborative approach to its security solutions, working with the customer on business needs and concerns to build bespoke solutions.

Digital Transformation:

  • Atturra
  • Aware Services
  • Blue Connections IT
  • BPC Technology
  • Clade - A Brennan Company
  • Ericom
  • Fujitsu
  • Insight
  • Intuit Technologies
  • Lanrex
  • Logicalis
  • Oreta
  • Outcomex
  • The Missing Link
  • Versent

Highly Commended: The Missing Link

Winner: Intuit Technologies

Intuit Technologies wins this award for working in partnership with industry-leading vendors to ensure product knowledge, pricing, and certification levels are current and competitive. With the purpose of understanding customers’ needs to add value and power digital transformation, Intuit Technologies has focused on ensuring customer success, empowering staff and workplace of choice, creating strong partnerships, and prioritising simple and connected operations.

Emerging:

  • Arq Group
  • DiUS
  • Konica Minolta
  • meldCX
  • MobileCorp
  • Tecala Group
  • Telstra Purple

Winner: Tecala Group

With decades of experience in infrastructure, managed services and cloud, Tecala built a dedicated intelligent business practice featuring senior resources across business analysts, AI/ML practice managers, developers, RPA and data engineers. Its Contract Processing and Review Automation solution uses RPA, AI/ML to assess and review contracts with human-like insights, saving customers precious time in contract management.

Homegrown ISV:

  • AbilityMap
  • ActivePort Group
  • Aqura Technologies
  • Atlastix
  • Barhead Solutions
  • Cyara
  • iasset.com
  • Kiandra
  • meldCX
  • OrionVM

Highly Commended: Barhead Solutions

Winner: Atlastix

Atlastix wins this award for its creation of a monitoring and observability solution for mission critical enterprise hybrid-cloud applications and infrastructure. Customers using Atlastix’s platform can plan major application upgrades, benchmark competing cloud providers, baseline seasonal load, perform user behavioural analysis, identify poorly performing application elements and more.

Read more on the next page...

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AUSTRALIA-WIDE INNOVATION

Australia-wide Innovation recognises partners delivering customer innovation headquartered outside of the two most-populated metropolitan areas in the country. This is a partner is a market-leading specialist which thrives in challenging end-user environments, sparking new ideas and outcomes through an unconventional approach to technology consulting and implementation. Note: This award is open to partners headquartered outside of Sydney and Melbourne.

National:

  • Link Digital (Canberra, ACT)
  • Nexion Networks (Perth, Western Australia)
  • Patient Zero (Brisbane, Queensland)
  • TelcoDataCloud (Adelaide, South Australia)

Winner: Patient Zero 
 
Patient Zero has been recognised for its delivery of consulting engagements and implementation via its unique ‘Way of Working’ model to help overcome delivery challenges. The Brisbane-headquartered application developer gears each of its consulting engagements towards driving organisational change and transformation resulting in winning and growing significant customer accounts.  

Regional:

  • Aqura Technologies (Perth, Western Australia)
  • Area9 IT Solutions (Darwin, Northern Territory)
  • Colton Computer Technologies (Orange, New South Wales)
  • Int Tec Solutions (Mildura, Victoria)
  • Intuit Technologies (Hobart, Tasmania)
  • Leading Edge Data Centres (Tamworth, New South Wales)

Highly Commended: Area9

Winner: Colton Computer Technologies

Based in NSW town of Orange, Colton Computer Technologies protects its customers through a business continuity series, dedicating a high level of resources towards cyber security education and support. It has also worked closely with local medical practices to update their email encryption.

START-UP INNOVATION

Start-up Innovation recognises market-leading start-ups building unique businesses to bring innovative new technologies to the Australian market. Note: All submissions must be from Australian-based start-ups.

Product:

  • ActivePort Group
  • Arrow Digital
  • Cybermate
  • Fifth Logic
  • meldCX
  • Swoop Aero
  • Wondaris

Winner: Cybermate

Cybermate wins this award for its cyber security training and awareness platform, which was designed from the ground up to address people’s online risky behaviour. It features awareness training, simulated attacks, dark web scanning, secure messaging and more.

Sector:

  • Cybermate
  • Fifth Logic
  • Nueva Solutions
  • Utecture

Winner: utecture 

Introduced into the market last year, utecture is pre-construction design platform that uses digital twinning technology to deliver design, real-time pricing, visualisation and management. 
The start-up is led by a team of building and technology executives including Bob Henessy - former CIO of Lendlease and Gavin Tonnet, who has been involved in urban renewal/smart cities projects.  

Customer Value:

  • Arinco
  • Delta Insights
  • Nueva Solutions

Winner: Nueva Solutions

Founded in 2020 by Cameron Cumming and Ferdinand Tadiaman, Nueva Solutions prides its value on its knowledge base and highly skilled security specialists to help customers navigate the complex cyber security environment. Nueva has built several managed service offerings for customers spanning Nueva SOC and as–a-service solutions in endpoint protection, governance risk and compliance, pentest and phishing simulation, landing key customer wins since its inception.

Entrepreneur:

  • Amit Sethi - BluBiz Solutions
  • Vanessa McCarthy - Education Compliance Validators
  • Fergus Creese - My Careers

Winner: My Careers - Fergus Creese

My Careers began in 2018 and developed a software platform to support the unique learning journey of students from school through to employment by gathering data much earlier. This data forms the basis of a lifelong profile, transcending the resume and ultimately creating a new credential set of information for potential employment.

VENDOR INNOVATION

Vendor Innovation recognises vendors helping partners deliver transformative solutions and services to customers, operating market-leading approaches to engagement and enablement across the key technology segments of Cloud, Security, Hardware, Software, Networking, Collaboration and Specialist.

Cloud:

  • Avaya
  • Dynatrace
  • GoTo
  • Hewlett Packard Enterprise
  • Kong
  • Nice
  • Nutanix
  • OrionVM
  • Thousand Eyes, part of Cisco
  • Veeam
  • VMware

Winner: Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Hewlett Packard Enterprise wins this award for the new enhancements and cloud services to its HPE GreenLake, consisting of a redefined modern private cloud that provides a cloud-native experience to power organisations’ hybrid strategy. HPE GreenLake currently caters to more than 65,000 customers worldwide with over one exabyte of data in total under management.

Security:

  • Armis
  • Barracuda Networks
  • BlackBerry
  • Check Point Software Technologies
  • Cisco
  • CrowdStrike
  • ExtraHop
  • Fortinet
  • LogRhythm
  • Mimecast
  • Proofpoint
  • SentinelOne
  • Sophos
  • Watchguard Technologies
  • Zscaler

Winner: Fortinet

Fortinet’s expansion of its channel support has seen it assist partners go to market with products and ideas to push them into lucrative markets in the security space. It aligns its partners to its own channel strategy, helping them grow and run their own channel marketing activities.

Hardware:

  • Cisco
  • Dell Technologies
  • Dynabook
  • Hewlett Packard Enterprise
  • HP
  • Lenovo
  • Schneider Electric
  • SoftIron

Highly Commended: SoftIron

Winner: HP

HP wins this award in recognition of its transformation journey from a purely hardware vendor to a strategic technology partner, encompassing hardware, software, solutions, and full ecosystem offerings. Partner enablement and training is reflected in the reinvention of HP University and product solution certifications to educate partners around key HP product offerings and services. Additionally, the launch of the HP Essentials content series sees the delivery of specialised training modules for partners.

Software:

  • Aruba, A Hewlett Packard Enterprise company
  • Thousand Eyes, part of Cisco
  • HashiCorp
  • M-Files
  • Sana Commerce
  • SolarWinds
  • Veeam
  • Zoom

Highly Commended: Veeam

Winner: HashiCorp

HashiCorp wins this award for designing an A/NZ-focused partner program that delivers a prescriptive framework and set of assets to help customers achieve their technical and business outcomes with HashiCorp Tools. Using these set of cloud agnostic tools for automation and provisioning, partners are given the opportunity to pivot their services offerings to support multi-cloud adoption.

Networking:

  • ActivePort Group
  • Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company
  • Cisco Meraki
  • CommScope
  • Cradlepoint
  • Telstra

Winner: Aruba, a HPE company

2021 saw the Aruba team focus on helping partners to build or augment their business to ensure long-term success. Aruba has invested heavily in supporting partners to build their managed services practice or as-a-service businesses, addressing the growing demand in-market for network flexibility and scalability. It has renewed competencies to give partners the ability to offer more to customers, as well as become more profitable.

Collaboration:

  • Access4
  • Avaya
  • Cisco
  • GoTo
  • N-able
  • Poly
  • RingCentral
  • Yarnlab
  • Zoom

Winner: Cisco

Cisco wins this award for the launch of its new Webex wholesale route-to-market, equipping service provider partners with new managed services offering, and elevating their ability to deliver customer experiences that transform the way they work. The partner onboarding experience includes dedicated Cisco experts, paired with comprehensive online training and a robust set of migration and marketing toolkits to drive market demand and serve SMB customers. 

Specialist:

  • Atlassian
  • BidFin
  • Cohesity
  • ConnectWise
  • Claroty
  • Datto
  • Dragonfly Technologies
  • LastPass
  • MyCISO
  • Poly
  • Rapid7

Highly Commended: Rapid7

Winner: Atlassian

Atlassian wins this award for its creation of the Detections Program, a scheme to reduce the impact of security incidents; improve detection forecasts and increase the proportion of detectable incidents. Atlassian has achieved this through a winning combination of automation, high standards, concepts and processing and finally metrics and tracking. Daily attentiveness and occasional heroics are also critical to its success in protecting itself and customers from cyber threats.

DISTRIBUTOR INNOVATION

Distributor Innovation recognises distributors spearheading ecosystem innovation and growth through transformative approaches to vendor engagement and partner enablement, spanning the core categories of Hardware, Software, Specialist. Creativity and Incubation.

Hardware:

  • Arrow
  • Dicker Data
  • Ingram Micro
  • Leader
  • Westcon-Comstor

Winner: Dicker Data

Dicker Data has positioned itself as Australia’s largest hardware distributor, holding a majority market share in every major hardware brand it represents whilst also transacting with over 6,200 active partners, producing more than $2.5B in revenue purely from the SMB, mid-market, corporate and commercial segments. Dicker Data values its hardware inventory holding very highly. It took large stock positions while the global chip shortage started, giving customers access and supporting their needs.

Software:

  • Arrow
  • Dicker Data
  • Nextgen Group
  • Pax8
  • Rhipe
  • Westcon-Comstor

Winner: rhipe

rhipe wins this award in recognition of its several initiatives to help empower partners to grow their businesses and support them in promoting the work they are doing with nonprofits through rhipe for Change. This is an extension to Microsoft’s Tech for Social Impact (TSI) initiative, which helps partners expand their practice and reach new customers through an initiative that delivers both business growth and positive social change.

Specialist:

  • Ingram Micro (Specialist Division)
  • Nextgen Optima
  • Partner Wholesale Networks
  • Tech Data
  • Tradewinds Technology Brokerage
  • Westcon-Comstor


Winner: Ingram Micro 

Ingram Micro wins this award for launching its XRaaS (Extended Reality as a Service) solution in the first quarter of 2022 to enhance frontline worker success through contextual training and frontline enablement in real-time. The solution has allowed dispersed teams to benefit from continuous access to expert support, in order to maintain business continuity and optimise productivity. 

Creativity:

  • Aria Technologies
  • Arrow
  • Exclusive Networks
  • Ingram Micro
  • Matchboard
  • Pax8
  • Tech Data
  • Westcon-Comstor

Winner: Exclusive Networks

As a value-added distributor Exclusive Networks is continually innovating to create value for each of its vendors and delivering initiatives that will assist with vendor growth aspirations. By developing and launching Exclusive Network's very own MSSP platform, and offering consumption-based monthly billing for partners, we have been able to support the channel growth of one of its strategic vendors.

Incubation:

  • Leader
  • Nextgen oSpace
  • Westcon-Comstor

Winner: NEXTGEN oSpace

NEXTGEN wins this award for enabling start-ups to enter markets through its new business unit oSpace which combines deep data intelligence, demand generation, account-based marketing, and sales augmentation and execution. oSpace has created a foundation that vendors and their partners can rely on to drive scalable business opportunities and rapidly grow their presence in the local market.

PERSONAL INNOVATION

Personal Innovation recognises standout individuals who contribute to customer, company and channel success through a transformative approach to management, channel, sales, technical and marketing positions.

Channel Excellence (Vendor):

  • Mert Mustafa - Check Point Software Technologies
  • Kelly Sabo - Cisco
  • Shaun Witherden - Datto
  • Kris Hansen - Proofpoint (formerly Delinea)
  • Shanthi Arul - Dropbox
  • Tanya Hovagimian - ExtraHop
  • Stefan Compagnoni - Extreme Networks
  • Jordana Desmyth - HP
  • Cheryl Sullivan - Lenovo
  • Kushani Sriwardene - Microsoft
  • Andrew Charitou - NBN
  • Rhys George - NetApp
  • Beau Alderson - Schneider Electric
  • Kevin Liebenberg - Sophos
  • Steven Hickey - Veeam

Winner: Mert Mustafa - Check Point Software

Mert first joined Check Point in 2019 and, since then, has built the vendor’s Telstra channel to be a multi-million-dollar business. Having built an extensive group of telco partners, Mert has significantly increased the broader footprint inside Check Point’s Telstra managed services, Telstra Purple, and Telstra Cloud. Due to his success, Mert's role was expanded to cover all the carrier, channel and telco business for Check Point Australia.

Channel Excellence (Distributor):

  • Ash Barron - Arrow
  • Tina Kuleski - Dicker Data
  • John Brown - Ingram Micro
  • James Walters - Nextgen Group
  • Pathum Bandara - Rhipe
  • Tony Heywood - Tradewinds Technology Brokerage
  • Kristal Wheeler - Westcon-Comstor

Highly Commended: James Walters - NEXTGEN Group

Winner: John Brown - Ingram Micro

With more than 20 years experience, John has been recognised for his design and implementation of campaigns for a key technology partner that optimised commercial levers to improve business partner working capital and profitability, and end-user demand generation activities. Skewing away from traditional marketing, his ideas around content creation, digital end-user targeting and lead progression sequences not only generated organic opportunities and revenue for Ingram Micro’s partner base but branded them as thought leader experts.

Technical Excellence (Partner):

  • Steven Tan - AC3
  • Brett Tyson - ASG Group
  • David Barbagallo - ASI Solutions
  • Jay Shah - Capgemini
  • Michael O'Leary - Cevo
  • David Sampson - Chamonix IT Solutions
  • Nikhil Mathew - Cognizant
  • Etienne Oosthuysen - Exposé
  • Phill McSherry - MobileCorp
  • Paul Seymour - Patient Zero
  • Oshadha Ranaweera - Somerville
  • Brent Harrison - Sourced Group
  • Arun Kannan - Tata Consultancy Services

Highly Commended: Paul Seymour - Patient Zero

Winner: Steven Tan - AC3 

Steven Tan wins this award for his in-depth knowledge of AWS, boasting a number of certifications, including the highest level of generalist certification available. Steven is also a trained software engineer and an expert in Cisco. He is constantly looking for new opportunities to increase his technical knowledge through formal and informal, on-the-job training.

Technical Excellence (Vendor):

  • Mitchell Davis - Access4
  • Scott Hesford - BeyondTrust
  • Sadiq Iqbal - Check Point Software Technologies
  • Jason Mantell - Cloudian
  • Sen Philip - CrowdStrike
  • Mina Mousa - Extreme Networks
  • Joel Lopez - Fujitsu
  • Jason Deane - Schneider Electric
  • Ian Frodsham-Budd - Veeam
  • Samantha Treacy - VMware
  • Matthew See - Watchguard Technologies

Highly Commended: Joel Lopez - Fujitsu

Winner: Sen Philip - CrowdStrike

Sen has picked up many certifications and has undergone rigorous internal training at CrowdStrike to be fully certified across three core areas within the business, proving his technical excellence. He also stepped up and demonstrated specific use cases of CrowdStrike’s Falcon Identity product during its launch period, showing to partners how it stood apart from other offerings on the market.

Technical Excellence (Distributor):

  • Gabriel Ripoll - Arrow
  • Ben Le Huray - Ingram Micro
  • Ben Sullivan - Dragos (formerly NEXTGEN Group)
  • Abey George - Westcon-Comstor

Winner: Ben Sullivan - Dragos (formerly NEXTGEN Group)

Ben wins this award for growing a strong network within NEXTGEN’s A/NZ partner base, representing the company’s largest cyber vendors and fuelling the growth of its cyber business by more than 200 per cent FY22. Vendors and partners have relied on him for positioning vendor solutions, partner accreditations, customer facing engagements, and more. Ben is also the driving force behind NEXTGEN’s CyberLAB solution and has taken an active role in new vendor technology discoveries and integrations.

Marketing Excellence (Partner):

  • Dorota Martinez - 8Squad
  • Emily Penn-Tonkin - Arinco
  • Georgia Swanson - Arq Group
  • Alvin Paronda - Barhead Solutions
  • Renata Di Stefano - blueAPACHE
  • Erica Smith - Blue Connections IT
  • Sophia Siegele - Chamonix IT Solutions
  • Michelle Lewis - MobileCorp
  • Jodie Meyerov - Perfekt
  • Sanya Turkalj - Sourced Group
  • Prayna Prasad - Stax
  • Jemma Healy - Tecala

Winner: Renata Di Stefano - blueAPACHE

Renata Di Stefano has developed blueAPACHE’s marketing department from scratch, developing a fully integrated brand strategy and marketing plan to elevate the organisation globally. She has played a pivotal role in the acquisition of several of blueAPACHE’s largest customers and also established its vendor alliance program. Striving to raise the blueAPACHE brand in the market, Di Stefano has built a significant pipeline of digital, PR and customer advocacy programs, as well as regular customer roundtable events.

Marketing Excellence (Vendor):

  • Farzeen Quadir-Hegde - ASUS
  • Katrina Nicol - Check Point Software Technologies
  • Cecilia Huang - CommScope
  • Bel Bennett - Dropbox
  • Jessica Stark - GoTo
  • Jacqueline Carreto - Lenovo
  • Kristal Jamieson - One Little Seed
  • Babita Rawat - Schneider Electric
  • Tracey Reed - SentinelOne
  • Debra Sutton - WalkMe

Highly Commended: Debra Sutton - WalkMe

Winner: Tracey Reed - SentinelOne

With more than 22 years experience under her belt, Tracey Reed joined SentinelOne last year charged with bolstering partner engagement, commitment and sales development. Her skills and industry knowledge have led to delivering effective campaigns using all facets of the marketing mix to ensure maximum exposure and lead development within budget. She has regularly achieved pipeline targets and consistently hits communication project deadlines.

Marketing Excellence (Distributor):

  • Aline Horrocks - Arrow
  • Paul Manio - Ingram Micro
  • Seamus Pearson - Westcon-Comstor

Winner: Seamus Pearson - Westcon-Comstor

Seamus Pearson has been recognised for his marketing leadership skills and playing a pivotal role in guiding and driving Westcon-Comstor’s global marketing transformation to a digital-first approach. He has consistently demonstrated creating and executing marketing campaigns, programs and strategies that have driven incremental revenue, customer acquisition, loyalty and experience.

Sales Excellence (Partner)

  • Alex Slade - A Corp Computers
  • Jane Williams - AC3
  • Jason Eaton - ASI Solutions
  • Nicholas Maranville - blueAPACHE
  • Ali Syed - Cevo
  • Vinay Joshi - Exigo Tech
  • Hetal Dave - Infosys
  • Lisa Fortey - Logicalis
  • Tony Fulcher - Patient Zero
  • Paul Friend - The Missing Link

Highly Commended: Jason Eaton - ASI Solutions

Winner: Lisa Fortey - Logicalis

Lisa wins this award for establishing and driving growth strategies across key accounts. Among some of the many initiatives she has undertaken, she established focus groups and the company’s Industry Strategy Day – a pitching and reverse pitching exercise between vendors and the Logicalis teams – which has uncovered plenty of extra joint opportunities.

Sales Excellence (Vendor):

  • Charlie Wood - BeyondTrust
  • Leroy Daniel - BlackLine
  • Sam Boelens - Check Point Software Technologies
  • Reg Johnson - Cisco
  • James Wright - Cloudian
  • Joe Ciardi - Lenovo
  • John Hickman - Schneider Electric
  • Daniel Michel - VMware
  • Gareth Irlam - Vocus

Winner: Reg Johnson - Cisco 

Reg has been instrumental in bringing Cisco’s Country Digital Acceleration program into Australia, a $61 million investment in fostering Australia’s digitisation. Through his efforts, Cisco has developed new connections with universities and other leading industry players, leading to new market creation and some significant technology transformation projects. Reg has also contributed thought leadership on the full value of digital technologies and how they can be used to navigate major market transitions.

Management Excellence (Partner):

  • Dan Marsh - AC3
  • James Litjens - Arq Group
  • Justin Lowe - ASI Solutions
  • Jon Lang - DDLS Group
  • Anthony Woodward - Logicalis
  • Peter Jonson - MobileCorp
  • Paul Glass - Nexion Networks
  • Brendan Homann - Patient Zero
  • Tim Baguley - Sourced Group
  • John Jurkov - The Missing Link

Winner: John Jurkov - The Missing Link

John Jurkov has been part of The Missing Link for more than five years, starting out as a security consultant and eventually stepping up to the role of principal consultant, taking charge of managing and growing a multimillion dollar team. Since his promotion, John has thrived in the new role and continues to display the qualities that define a true leader in areas such as recruitment, optimising cash flow and boosting team morale.

Management Excellence (Vendor):

  • Vijay Raghvani - BlackLine
  • Leo Lynch - Check Point Software Technologies
  • Luke Power - Trellix (formerly Cisco)
  • Nick Cross - Citrix
  • Shant Soghomonian - Dell Technologies
  • Cassandra Ashworth - DocuSign
  • Luke Simmons - Dropbox
  • Yvette McEnearney - GoTo
  • Sunny Gandhi - Lenovo
  • Ras Jayawickrama - Schneider Electric
  • Anthony Daniel - WatchGuard Technologies

Winner: Shant Soghomonian - Dell Technologies

Shant has spearheaded many successful partnerships, projects and initiatives as Dell Technologies’ channel lead, which has earned him this award. He has improved how his channel team executes on the Dell Technologies Partner Program and his integrity earned him the trust of his team and partners in A/NZ. 

Management Excellence (Distributor):

  • John Poulter - Comstor
  • Sarah Kittiphongphaisan - Exclusive Networks
  • Jenelle Carmody - Ingram Micro
  • Gavin Lawless - Nextgen Group
  • Ruth Lavelle - Rhipe
  • David Peach - Westcon Group

Winner: Gavin Lawless - NEXTGEN Group

During the past 20 years, Gavin Lawless has had a significant impact on the Australian channel with some of his career success including running Avnet Australia prior to joining NEXTGEN in 2018. Shortly afterwards he was promoted to managing director before rising through the ranks as Group COO. Lawless has been credited for producing phenomenal results by coordinating efforts across vendors, partners and business units while showing a unique humbleness, strength of character, and unwavering loyalty and integrity.

HALL OF FAME

ARN Hall of Fame 2022 Inductee: Tara Ridley

Tara Ridley’s outstanding career dedicated to the channel actually started with a ‘sliding doors’ moment.

Having arrived on day one at a titan of technology in the early 1990s – thinking a career in marketing beckoned – an unexpected assignment to sales ignited a flame which more than 25 years on, shows no sign of burning out.

With the door thankfully swinging in the direction of the ecosystem, Tara has since forged a reputation as a relentless partner advocate – built on passion, relationships and trust.

Following more than a decade at Hewlett Packard and Macquarie Telecom, Tara spent the next 13 years rising through the management ranks within Cisco – running key partner accounts, sales and services functions, before taking the reins as channel chief. From excelling at Cisco to now shining at Salesforce, Tara's service to the channel cannot be understated.