Cisco Loses Distribution Exec

DiLullo had been in the role for about a year and was instrumental in inking Cisco&'s recent partnership with D&H Distributing, which marked the first time in a decade that the San Jose, Calif.-based vendor had expanded its distribution ranks.

He resigned Friday and is expected tomorrow to be named as vice president of worldwide sales at a security vendor.

“We&'re going to be hiring a new leader for distribution,” said Keith Goodwin, senior vice president of worldwide channels at Cisco, who will personally fill the role until a replacement is found.

“The goal is to fill it quickly because it is such an important role,” Goodwin said, noting that distribution accounts for about 28 percent of Cisco&'s partner business. “It&'s large but it&'s also strategic because distribution is the primary way we go to market to the commercial space, which is the fastest growing space for us right now” he said.

Cisco is looking both internally and externally to hire its next distribution head, Goodwin said.

DiLullo&'s successor will be charged with continuing Cisco&'s efforts to move toward a consolidated, consistent worldwide distribution model--an effort that is approximately 75 percent implemented--as well as its efforts to recruit SMB-focused partners, Goodwin said.

“If we believe that commercial is our opportunity, and we want to invest in commercial, that means we need to make sure we have the right set of resellers, and those resellers are typically affiliated with distribution,” Goodwin said.

In addition to the new D&H partnership, which came about primarily because of the distributor&'s strong SMB focus, Cisco also has ongoing SMB VAR recruitment efforts with its other three distributors, Ingram Micro, Tech Data and Westcon Group&'s Comstor division.