Global Technology Distribution Council Names New CEO

As CEO of the GTDC, Curran will work to increase the group's efforts to articulate the value of distribution to Wall Street and manufacturers through a new product activity report and its annual summit.

Curran, who resigned last month from Tech Data, replaces Carol Miltner, who is leaving to spend more time with her family. "We're so fortunate to have Tim. I don't believe his background could be any more perfect," said Miltner, referring to Curran's past channel roles at Panasonic and Tech Data, and his strong research background. Miltner made the announcement Friday.

Curran said his first priority is to oversee the release of the GTDC's sales-out data collection and reporting project, which launches in October and will track members' aggregate sales by SKU and category on a weekly and monthly basis. "We have to establish that from a marketing point of view as an authoritative source of data," he said. "If we can do that, it will reflect well on distribution." The report will be sold to vendors and analysts to help them gauge the sale of products into specific markets.

His other priority is to attract key vendors to the group's annual summit. "We have to make the summit the place for vendors and distributors to talk openly about pressing channel issues and the need to work more cooperatively together to accomplish both our goals," he said.

The major issue distributors have to clarify with vendors is the cost-effectiveness of the two-tier distribution model, Curran said.