With an increasing number of organizations investing in digital services to gain business advantage, channel partners need to transform the way they have been operating in the market. Traditional approaches may hamper growth, warns Amit Malhotra, Managing Director, IDC India and South Asia, to channel partners at @GATES_Summit #India.
According to Malhotra, to meet customer demand efficiently, channel partners must undergo massive transformation in three areas: skills, business and technology.
Now in its fourth edition, the GATES India ICT Reseller Summit begins with much fanfare in Westin Kolkata this year. The three day annual summit held from September 4-6, brings together international technology vendors with channel executives from across India including several key distributors, system integrators and resellers to drive the channel business in the country.
Ashish Kapahi, CEO at GATES APAC, said: “Building relationships with key partners in the SME channel ecosystem is critical to a vendor’s success in India. With this fourth event dedicated fully to the Indian market, GATES is continuing to play a critical role in bringing new partners together.”
He believes that Kolkata is the perfect host city for the Summit. The gateway to East India, Kolkata is a dominant cultural and business force in the nation. The city embodies the spirit of opportunity and connectivity at heart the GATES platform.”
GATES’s proven concept creates an incredibly efficient business platform. The event connects local channel executives with top international technology vendors. The unique format hosts an informative conference with leading industry voices, arranges pre-scheduled one-on-one meetings with innovative technology brands, and creates valuable networking opportunities.
The GATES summit provides ICT vendors and channel executives a great opportunity to interact and engage with one another. The sessions will focus on the challenges and opportunities faced by the channel partners in India as the industry is keeping pace with digital transformation. A series of interactive workshops will provide executives an opportunity to debate and strategize about important issues impacting India’s SME channel landscape.
Starting today and for the next two days, the event is set to see eminent vendors such as CrowdStrike, Toshiba and Xerox, among others, addressing the gathering of channel partners and offering their critical perspectives on trends and directions in the marketplace.
Shankaracharya Laskar, Director Marketing at Xerox India said that channel partners are critical to our success. The company is enabling channel partners in digital printing and managed printing services segment from where it sees maximum enterprise and SMB demand.
“At GATES Summit, we are going to meet with resellers and system integrators to share more about Xerox’s digital offerings and solutions for SMEs,” he added.
The highlight of day one of the event was a panel discussion, titled “Top Channel Voices,” featuring senior executives who debated the challenges and opportunities for India’s channel partners.
“There are so many issues that require constant attention, like compliance,” said Rajendra Seksaria, CEO of Balaji Solutions, who highlighted the need to stay ahead of the curve in a rapidly-changing industry.
Kaushik Pandya, CEO of Kalp Systems and Founder President of FITAG (Federation of Information Technology Association of Gujarat), emphasized the importance of building win-win relationships between vendors and channel partners.
The GATES organizers also announced the formation of a VIP jury panel to shortlist nominees for the ICT Excellence Awards 2018. Participating members of the jury panel include executives from leading distributors and resellers as well as independent experts from research and media companies.
The summit offers a strong platform to host the ICT Excellence Awards, by bringing together the channel community from across India at one place, one time. Winners will be determined by a live vote of all participating channel partners at the gala dinner on the final night of GATES Summit.
The ICT Excellence Awards 2018 will feature 13 categories, including, Computing, imaging, storage, printing & Print Solutions, display Vendor, security & surveillance, networking, power management, IT software and cloud vendor for the year. Special Categories will include new to market Vendor, marketing excellence and overall outstanding performance.
Ryan Mackey, Director for Business, Communications and Research at GATES APAC, said, “The ICT Excellence Awards are incredibly important because they are chosen directly by the channel. Voters are those distributors and resellers who are on the front lines of the business in India. For this reason, vendors put great stock in this recognition.”
The event will also see a series of high-level partnerships with leading industry associations, groups whose critical mission is to champion their members and represent regional interests at a national level. This year, the key support comes from Infotech Software Dealers Association (ISODA) and the Computer Association of Eastern India (COMPASS).