Tech Data Melds Pro A/V, Peripherals Units

The Pro A/V unit is expanding its line card to include displays, mounting hardware and content development software from a range of vendors, including Sony Media, Chief, OmniMount, Sanus Systems and Syntax Brillian. Tech Data also recently added speaker products from Klipsch Audio Technologies and Kramer Electronics distribution amplifiers.

Wendy Linsky, vice president of peripherals product marketing at Tech Data, said the Pro A/V offerings will be a good fit for the peripherals division, which brings solid knowledge and support for products like projectors and displays.

Robert Nishida, president and owner of Blu Ray Enterprises, a solution provider in Woodland Hills, Cali., has spent his first year in business focusing on the digital signage market and thinks the expertise and information that Tech Data's Pro A/V group provides has been valuable.

"No one else [in distribution] has a group dedicated to pro A/V. These guys know what they're talking about. They know their products. They know the technologies," Nishida said.

Tech Data is seeing digital signage gain traction in a variety of commercial markets, according to Linsky.

"Digital signage, if you really think about the solution that it provides, we're seeing that from the very small-scale application up to the very large commercial or government application as well," she said. "We have a wide variety of customers today that are buying the products from us, from the very small pro A/V dealer to the larger ones to the typical IT reseller that's just breaking into the digital signage space."