Ingram Recruits For Cisco

Ingram Micro has begun using its regional account managers to identify partners that would be good matches for Cisco. In many cases, the partners are new to the Cisco fold, said Chuck Robbins, vice president of U.S. channels at Cisco, and Joe Gruca, vice president of U.S. VAR sales at Ingram Micro, Santa Ana, Calif.

"An example might be in the West, [where] we've gone out and identified a bunch of partners that are trying to get into the security space, we put some focus from a Cisco and Ingram perspective around that thing, and all of a sudden you get a whole new list of partners that Cisco didn't know about that begin selling their product line," Gruca said.

This fall, Ingram Micro is preparing to launch a standardized, nationwide version of its regional efforts under a project dubbed Glacier, Gruca said.

For solution provider Nitech, the improved partnership it now enjoys with Cisco as a result of the campaign has helped it increase its sales of Cisco networking gear 100 percent this quarter compared to the previous quarter, said Dan Nickel, president of the Irvine, Calif.-based company.

"It's been an area we're starting to focus on because our sales reps have been getting more support and making money with it," Nickel said of his company's Cisco business.