This week, retailers and vendors will converge on San Diego for Everything Channel's RetailVision show to talk about strategies in the cutthroat retail market. Here we collect 25 (plus a few extra) hot products vendors will be showcasing.
A talent search, a maker fair, and of course Intel's latest cutting-edge chips were featured at last week's Intel Developers Forum.
Everything Channel went deep into the heart of Texas to honor 17 vendors at the 2008 VARBusiness Annual Report Card awards ceremony in Dallas. Here's a look at who lassoed the top prizes.
Plan Ahead To Walk AwayReady to give up the rat race? (Who likes racing rats, anyway?) If you own your solution provider business, have you planned for the possibility of giving it up? What if an offer arrives unexpectedly--will you know what you need to do? At a panel at last week's XChange '08, experts offered advice on valuing and selling your business: "One area where owners tend to make the biggest mistakes is in the valuation of their businesses, said Frank Helstab, managing director of The Institute for Corporate Planning & Finance. Don't leave it up to your accountant, Helstab said. His or her job is to make your business look as small as possible for tax purposes. It's a different game when you're trying to assess to true worth of your business to a potential buyer." Posted by Joe Caponi at 10:59 AM, August 27, 2008 Relationships Are Key For Fast Growth RetailersTell me if any of this sounds familiar: "Micro Center doesn't focus on the sale... but on the buyer--cultivating customers to make the first time someone steps into one of its stores the first time of many. It's all about offering them the tools and solutions that best fit their lifestyle." Solution providers know all about solution selling. But retailers? That quote comes from Kevin Jones, vice president of merchandising at Micro Center, a 21-store Ohio-based retailer. With big box retailers struggling, the Fast Growth Retailers featured in our latest CRN cover story are taking a different approach. Posted by Joe Caponi at 10:55 AM, August 25, 2008 Introducing PromoFinderThe hardware world changes fast, and products and prices come and go quickly. We offer our Pricing and Availabillity tool to research specific products, but to take advantage of up-to-the-minute price breaks, we've just launched PromoFinder. PromoFinder gives solution providers the opportunity to see the latest exclusive offers from hardware and software vendors. Consider it a Woot! for the channel! Check it out and let us know if it helps you build better quotes for you and your customers. Posted by Joe Caponi at 12:02 PM, August 22, 2008 The Fastest Route To VistaYou know you need new hardware to take advantage of Microsoft Vista. How about a Mac? With three viable solutions, the Channel Test Center reports that solution providers have an embarrassment of Vista-on-Mac riches to offer: "Performance-wise, it seemed that Vista liked running on the Mac mini. Geekbench results averaged an impressive 2,040. These are results that are almost equivalent to prior testing of Vista on PCs with double the memory and comparable processors." Posted by Joe Caponi at 11:04 AM, August 22, 2008 Annual Report Card Awards 2008Monday night, Everything Channel presented it's Annual Report Card Awards, where vendors are rated by their own solution provider partners in eighteen technology categories, and scored for product innovation, support and partnership criteria. At the end, Cisco walked away with the ARC Company of the Year award and HP's Adrian Jones and Panasonic's Sheila O'Neil wom Channel Executive of the Year awards, chosen by Everything Channel editors. Full scorecards for each category will be upcoming on ChannelWeb and in VARBusiness. The award ceremony was one highlight of the XChange '08 conference. Don't miss these other Slightly Strange Scenes from the show. Posted by Joe Caponi at 10:39 AM, August 21, 2008 Forget Price. Sell Solutions.At this week's XChange '08 conference, Everything Channel CEO Robert Faletra advised solution providers on how to increase their margins: "'If you position yourself in the market properly you will get premium prices,' he told solution providers. 'Being able to define a business solution is where the profit lies.' Successful solution providers are structured around practice areas that can be either technology based such as virtualization and storage, or vertical markets such as healthcare or financial..." The funniest response came from Delta Max President Robert Swanson, who was heard saying, "Technology is so last decade." For more of Robert Faletra's advice on positioning your solution provider organization, see We Need To Talk Less--And Do More--About IT: "In the early days of the market, customers were willing to pay more for faster and better technology. Now they want the solutions and leverage that the legacy infrastructure offers." Posted by Joe Caponi at 03:47 PM, August 20, 2008 Reaching Out To New CustomersHow many new customers do you need to nurture each year to keep your organization growing? Reaching out to new, growing clients is critical, especially as many existing customers limit their spending, but it's a practice that solution providers frequently avoid. This week's VARBusiness cover story, How To Find New Customers presents an array of actionable ideas solution providers can implement now. "There are plenty of steps VARs and solution providers can take to drum up new business among small, midmarket and large companies. Many of these efforts can apply to all the market segments, and all are worth considering at a time when finding new customers is so critical to business success." Can state, local and education (SLED) markets be one of those growth opportunities? Tax revenues are down, but many states are increasing their investments in public safety and outsourcing, according to a GovernmentVAR report: "State CIOs... indicated that spending on records management and security remains a top priority... strong interest... on the part of state CIOs confirms the significant impact states see from loss of essential records and their willingness to address the security and preservation of that critical data." Posted by Joe Caponi at 11:49 AM, August 20, 2008 The Most Powerful Women of the ChannelIn our latest issue of VARBusiness, we recognize some of the Most Powerful Women of the Channel, including those at solution provider, distribution and vendor organizations. They describe how they've pursued their careers, and what challenges they're facing next. This year's report also spotlights some professional organizations for women that are making a difference; and some of the best advice our women of the channel have received. Posted by Joe Caponi at 11:11 AM, August 19, 2008 Virtualized Solutions Boost Real Life GrowthWhile building a leading-edge virtualization practice, solution provider GreenPages isn't afraid to eat its own dog food: "GreenPages itself is taking advantage of VMware virtualization software to improve its own business. [GreenPages CEO Ron Dupler] said GreenPages has reduced the number of servers it was running from 60 to four with virtualization. "For cost and profitability it is insane to be running all these servers when you can virtualize." he said." GreenPages is #263 on the VARBusiness 500 list this year. For the latest on server virtualization, don't miss Joe Kovar's update on VMWare's "counterattack" to Microsoft's Hyper-V technology. Posted by Joe Caponi at 11:27 AM, August 18, 2008 Look Up For SuccessKnowing what you do - and what you don't do - is key to establishing and growing any business, but particularly so for solution providers. Steven Burke profiles The ASI Group, which turned its back on its traditional business model to become a vertical specialist: "[President C. J. Ezell] made an all-out commitment to increase recurring revenue and brand his own company as the trusted source of all information technology for his health-care clients. That means white labeling products and services and putting his own brand in front of the client... It has paid huge dividends..." Posted by Joe Caponi at 01:50 PM, August 12, 2008 The HP-CDW Deal Under The MicroscopeRobert DeMarzo calls news of HP's deal with CDW the "Channel's Summer Blockbuster: "HP [will] co-fund 110 new HP-only salespeople inside CDW who will wake up every day with one goal--to sell HP products to businesses that employ 500 or fewer workers. By the way, there will be no shortage of accounts to target because HP is going to supply 500,000 net new customer leads for CDW to chase." DeMarzo sees the glass as half-full for SMB solution providers, though. "There are going to be many vendors scrambling to find a way to compete against HP in the SMB market, and they just might be willing to invest more in your organization." But rank-and-file VARs are wary about the deal's implications: "'There are a lot of dealers like us that are doing our best to cover that area. If CDW wants to compete, then they should do it at their own expense. HP should not be subsidizing them to compete with their other dealers,' said Mark Singh, president of ValCom Computer Center, an HP solution provider in Midland, Texas." While Craig Zarley says the deal's big loser may be HP itself: "What HP is betting with the CDW deal is that it can sell more products to small businesses using one large telesales organization than it can by better supporting thousands of local solution providers. It's lost that bet before." Posted by Joe Caponi at 02:56 PM, August 11, 2008 San Francisco's Childs: Still Employed, Still in JailNot much has changed since our last update on San Francisco network admin Terry Childs. Childs, who remains in jail on $5 million bail, is charged with computer tampering, and locking his superiors out of the city network he managed (he's since handed over the passwords). Though in jail, Childs remains employed. The Examiner reports: "Though city officials would not comment specifically on the Childs case because it is a personnel matter, Matt Dorsey, spokesman for the City Attorney, said he “would not dispute” that it could take longer than a year to discharge him." While the San Francisco Chronicle profiles Childs and provides contrasting portraits of him: as "a reliable, self-made professional who overcame a troubled childhood," but also as someone who "went overboard, turning the city's computer system into his own 'private network' after lying about his violent past to get his job." IDG's Paul Venezia has been covering the story in detail, providing both an in depth analysis Sorting Facts from Fiction in the Terry Childs Case, and the quicker Primer on the Terry Childs case for the non-technical: "Essentially what Childs' did was build a car, give the city the keys to start the engine and drive the car normally, but he locked the hood so nobody else could work on the car." Finally, the prosecution of Childs is not off to a good start: DA Admits Error In Exposing SF Passwords: "Including a list of more than 100 sensitive IP subnet addresses and virtual private network (VPN) passwords in public court filings for the Terry Childs case was a mistake, the San Francisco District Attorney's Office said over the weekend." The sensible move might be for San Francisco to cut a deal and put this behind them, though I wouldn't bet that's what will happen. Posted by Joe Caponi at 11:41 AM, August 7, 2008 |
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