QandA: Tom Ducatelli, Tech Data's VP of U.S. Sales

Tech Data recently tapped Tom Ducatelli as its senior vice president of U.S. sales, bolstering its domestic leadership team. Ducatelli will head up the distributor's U.S. sales organization and report directly to Ken Lamneck, Tech Data's president of the Americas. An IT industry veteran, Ducatelli most recently served as senior vice president of sales and business development for CompuCom Systems. He now takes over a territory that by many accounts has been the toughest region for global IT distributors; while Tech Data and others have grown rapidly overseas, domestic sales have been lukewarm. Part of the challenge has been the intense competition and pricing pressure among U.S. distributors (see "Competition Cools Comeback," page 20). Ducatelli talks with VARBusiness about the competition, channel consolidation and increasing distribution's value in the United States.

VB: How will your background on the channel side and vendor side help you in the new role at Tech Data?

Ducatelli: I've been in the industry 17 years. I spent six years at Digital Equipment Corp. as a salesperson selling Digital's own services, and had a very successful career there. Then 11 years ago, I was recruited by CompuCom Systems to focus on their managed-services business, which at the time didn't have a true definition. The idea was to get into the opportunity of wrapping services around the products CompuCom sold. About six years ago, I was asked to come out of the sales role and step into the role of vice president of business development. I picked up the supply-chain management organization, and that included inventory management, supplier relationships and product-marketing duties. Then most recently, I moved on to the national sales organization. So, I have a heavy background in working with vendor partners and distribution and a lot of experience in sales leadership.

VB: Given your background with CompuCom, what do you see as the major shifts in business in the channel?

Ducatelli: There's overlying pressure on margins, and that's driving them to find new businesses and solutions with higher value-add potential. Because of that, I'm seeing more migration to offer services as part of a product solution. That's taking place a lot around the midrange area, especially around servers and storage consolidation, and network management. Another trend we're seeing is the ongoing consolidation within the channel, where a lot of VARs are going to be acquiring, merging or selling. The economy has started to rebound, and some business owners are looking for an exit strategy. It's the perfect time now to bring a lot of companies together, and I think that brings a tremendous opportunity for Tech Data.

VB: How will channel consolidation be good for Tech Data?

Ducatelli: It will create stronger, combined companies that can offer more value to their client base. For example, through an acquisition a solution provider may pick up a capability for services that they didn't have previously. When you bring that additional value to a reseller with a secure customer base, you've opened up an opportunity to grow that business partner share with the client base and strengthen the financial viability of that company. So we're really keeping a close eye on those kinds of developments.

VB: What's your view of domestic IT demand for 2005, and how do you plan to get the most out of it?

Ducatelli: My plan to capture the available market is to continue with the processes and methodologies that have been implemented within Tech Data recently on working with our VAR clients--specifically how our salespeople identify our customers' unique needs from a broadline as well as [from] a specialized business perspective. That includes helping them drive costs out of their supply chains and take costs out of the business model overall. The key to our success is a very aggressive, outbound campaign to assist our clients in being more successful and profitable in running their businesses. We don't want them to just buy more product; we have to assist them so that their spend gets them more for their technology dollar. If you spend $1 with Tech Data, we want that $1 to be more valuable to the customer than anywhere else.

VB: How competitive is the U.S. market right now?

Ducatelli: I don't think it has gotten any worse or any better recently. It has always been a very competitive business. What will distinguish us is quality and operational efficiency. Price is important, but what you get for that spend needs to be taken into account. Where we're looking as a company now isn't where distribution is going to be in six to 12 months. We're looking at what we need to offer customers four or five years down the road.