Avaya and Distribution Central establish new business unit

Distribution Central has launched a new unified communications business division in partnership with communications vendor, Avaya.

Called Unity Systems, the division will be headed up by national sales manager, Steve Jones.

“Our engineers played with a lot of products and Avaya was the one that made a lot of sense to us in terms of opportunity for the channel,” Distribution Central marketing director, Nick Verykios, said. “Since Avaya was enhancing its distribution from the top to bottom with their products, it’s a great opportunity for the channel to do things they otherwise couldn’t.”

Unity Systems will offer Avaya’s entire range and aims to cover small and large integrators.

Distribution Central joins Avnet Technology Solutions in the Avaya line up. The vendor has also extended its relationship with Avnet, giving it access to the Unified Communications and Communications Manager portfolios. Previously Avnet had restricted access to the vendor’s IP Office offering.

Avaya South Pacific regional director of channels, Andy Hurt, said it had conducted an extensive search of local distributors.

“We needed a company that was willing to work with us in transitioning to a more channel-centric approach,” he said. “It’s clear they’ve got high-growth needs and they’ve got some great technology that will help us deliver on our vision to resellers.

“We have had the wheels in motion to implement an expanded channel model in Australia and to meet the needs of not only our business, but also what our customers are asking for.”

Hurt said it wanted to bring on more strategic partners.

“We’ve got a very good reach into the SMB market with our IP Office products, and a good penetration rate at the high-end with partners like NSC Group. We’ve just got a gap in the middle,” he said. “This mid-market space is an area we’re not into enough.”

Avaya visiting vice-president of worldwide channels, Jeremy Butt, said it was making aggressive moves into the channel on a worldwide basis.

“Globally, less than 50 per cent of our business goes through the channel and it’s just not the right mix. It needs to be significantly higher and we would like it to be 85 per cent,” Butt said. “Economic climate aside, we couldn’t hire enough direct sales people to cover the market anyway. It’s another reason for doing as much as we can through the channel, not just from a product but a services perspective as well.”

Butt said it was in the midst of putting the framework together to introduce a global partner program later this year.

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