Print.IT Reseller - issue 70

01732 759725 INTERVIEW 24 PrintIT Reseller spoke to Thomas Valjak, EMEA Channel VP at Lexmark about the launch of the company’s new worldwide channel programme and how Lexmark is looking to work more closely with its resellers and partners in 2020 Lexmark places renewed focus on the channel and also for end customers,” Valjak explained. “Reliability is another important factor that comes into play here. Lexmark designs devices that last for years to come. This also translates to sustainability and reduced environmental impact. Lexmark works to ensure its devices are in use for as long as possible, consumables and other replacement parts are manufactured using recycled materials, and we also operate a recycling programme for toner cartridges,” he added. Helping partners to differentiate The second pillar is built on the premise that Lexmark is committed to offering a range of solutions and approaches that can help partners, dependent on their capabilities, to differentiate. Examples include MPS Core, an evolution of its legacy MPS Express programme and Lexmark Industry Advantage, a recent offering that equips Lexmark partners with the vertical industry expertise needed to better serve their customers and grow their business. Lexmark is an established provider to some of the world’s largest organisations in industries including government, education, healthcare, financial services, manufacturing and retail. The Lexmark Industry Advantage programme is designed to share that valuable knowledge with partners. “Lexmark has more than a million devices that are directly managed globally. We utilise cloud-based software technologies to manage remote usage monitoring, pre-emptive service, etc. We can make that available to channel partners, as well as all of the insight we have gained from historic customer engagement across sectors such as financial services, healthcare, logistics and others,” Valjak said. The third pillar is helping partners to drive growth. “Despite analysts stating that the market is shrinking in terms of unit growth, Lexmark is bucking the trend. In 2019, in most markets, Lexmark enjoyed strong positive growth in terms of unit placements and we want to help our channel partners to capitalise on that growth opportunity,” he added. Sales programmes Valjak acknowledges that equipping partners with the right skills, knowledge about solutions, products and training is relatively standard across the industry. “All of that is still needed, however, what we are doing in addition is to put sales programmes in place to manage the channel in a more structured way,” he explained. This new initiative will extend across enterprise, large accounts and SMB business. “We are putting structures in place to make it much easier for partners to engage with us across all of the three pillars mentioned above, that is the driving force behind the new partner programme,” Valjak added. Last year, Lexmark launched the GO Line series, designed for small and medium-sized businesses, the range delivers enterprise-level durability, reliability, security and features in a smaller, lighter, lower cost device. “Over the last three quarters, we have looked carefully at customers’ buying behaviour and specifically where SMB customers make their purchases,” said Valjak. Lexmark printers continue to be for business use and across EMEA, devices are procured through IT resellers, retail outlets and e-tailers. “We are now launching a volume channel programme, specific to GO Line to extend our reach into these channels. We will be investing to support the channel to secure strong margin, as well as in providing marketing development funds to help them drive awareness and create demand with the Lexmark offering,” he added. MPS Core The introduction of MPS Core is a key component of Lexmark’s renewed channel focus. The legacy solution has been fine tuned to make it easier to deploy and thus enable broader adoption by channel partners. Since joining Lexmark, Valjak has been focussed on implementing new channel strategies and working to help its resellers and partners find a way to differentiate themselves and their services from competition. This work has culminated in the launch of a new worldwide channel programme – Lexmark Connect. The new programme has been 12 months in planning and has been developed after close collaboration with channel partners worldwide. The programme is underpinned by three pillars – the first is about enabling partners to deliver secure, reliable and sustainable devices. “This product-centric pillar is really supported by the careful design, development and manufacturing of devices that provide enterprise-class security across the entire portfolio from the smallest printer to the largest device, which is a benefit for partners Thomas Valjak