technologyreseller.co.uk 31 COVER STORY in. So to offer a smarter way of delivering this technology we’re working with Ingram Micro Financial Solutions to put together three and five-year plans, where, after the fifth year, the customer sends the display back and gets new technology. That’s the focus for us right now.” New UCC vendors Another big focus for Ingram Micro highlighted at Festival of Technology is the ongoing expansion of its UCC portfolio with the addition of four new vendors this year – Mersive, EPOS, Lenovo and HP. “We plan to have our good, better, best strategy across our four solutions pillars set – voice, video, platform and service – unless of course some revolutionary new unified comms technology comes out that everybody wants.” He says that the expansion of Ingram in warehouse and logistics and of course you need CCTV in those locations. They realised they’re missing a trick, and we’ve now got a lot of follow-up with those guys around getting them trained up to be able to specify that solution. “We had our specialist resellers there and we also had a lot of resellers in that small to medium business environment – what we call generalists. I would say at least 30% of the attendance was from that space. From the conversations I had with them, it is clear they are looking at new avenues around their margin stack. And our four technology areas – data capture, point of sale, audio-visual and physical security, and unified communications – sit at the higher end of margin availability.” The fact that 82% of visitors who registered in the morning were still at the event when broadcaster and ‘first generation geek’ Jason Bradbury gave the concluding keynote at 4.30 p.m. is testament to channel partners’ appetite to learn more about technologies in adjacent areas. New LED division To meet this demand Ingram Micro has been continuing to expand its own offering through new vendor partnerships within its UCC portfolio and the establishment of a new LED division. “We’ve always been very, very strong in the interactive technology space where we do a huge amount of work with our education resellers and corporate resellers. Our IT resellers were getting more and more interested in LED, especially in relation to total cost of ownership (TCO), so in Q4 2021 we started discussions with vendors such as Leyard, ViewSonic and Optoma that have flexible, mobile LED solutions that can be moved from room to room. “ViewSonic and Optoma have been partners of ours for a long, long time. However, we didn’t have LED within those contracts because with that technology you have to demonstrate to a vendor that you can add the value they need. It isn’t a line listed sale in any shape or form; you have to understand exactly what the reseller is looking for and be able to install that solution and potentially maintain and manage it as well.” Ingram Micro now has three people in its 14-strong AV team devoted to LED – a business development manager, a product manager and an internal salesperson. It has a demo area within its building where customers can come and see a bestin-class LED solution; it is working with specialist resellers to develop that valueadd proposal and provide a sales pipeline; and it is producing a range of marketing material to assist resellers. “We’re working on some white papers highlighting the TCO aspect. Hopefully, when those are finalised you’ll be able to see that there’s a significant saving in the total cost of ownership of LED versus LCD.” Pandya points out that Ingram Micro is also developing new financial solutions specifically for LED displays. “What’s very clear is nobody wants to own this technology; it is far too expensive and depreciation needs to be factored Continued... Broadcaster and ‘first generation geek’ Jason Bradbury
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NDUxNDM=