AdvanTel Networks, a San Jose, Calif.-based solution provider and top Avaya and Juniper partner, has confirmed Dan Ferguson as its new president and CEO, effective this week.
Ferguson previously was AdvanTel's CFO and vice president of sales and has been with the solution provider since 1986, when he was an intern and AdvanTel's first bookkeeper. He succeeds Roger McGibbon, who founded AdvanTel in 1984 and will remain as board chairman.
In a statement, McGibbon praised Ferguson's "years of hard work and loyalty."
"As our company continues to focus on delivering excellent service and compelling collaboration and communications solutions to our customers, Dan's experience in managing the different aspects of our business will be a significant asset in advancing our strategy," McGibbon said.
[Related: Avaya Expands Midmarket Push With Scaled-Up IP Office]
AdvanTel focuses on LAN, WLAN and WAN technologies, VoIP, unified communications, contact center, security and managed services. Earlier this year, the company acquired the customer base of a Portland, Ore.-based telephony VAR, ACT-Cascades, which was in the process of shutting down.
That acquisition, one of several examples of the ongoing Avaya channel consolidation following Avaya's 2009 acquisition of the former Nortel enterprise business, was AdvanTel's fifth buy overall and first since it acquired Prime Business Solutions in 2009.
"If another opportunity presents itself, we'll do another one," Ferguson told CRN in January 2012. "We've had other opportunities that we turned down. There is a fair amount of opportunity out there as the smaller shops get squeezed. A lot of them are in amazingly bad shape financially. It's amazing how many voice channel partners are completely upside down right now."
PUBLISHED SEPT. 5, 2012
