SonicWall and Cohort part ways

Distributor has stopped supplying SonicWall product, but will maintain services relationship

Grahame Smee: The product itself was not suitable for our value-add model

SonicWall and Cohort Technology have wound up their product supply relationship a little over a year after joining forces - but will continue to work together around services.

The security vendor appointed Cohort as a fifth distributor last June in a bid to grow its non-firewall revenues.

However, Andy Zollo, sales director for Northern Europe at SonicWall, admitted the relationship had fallen short of expectations.

“It wasn’t delivering what either of us wanted, so we mutually agreed to shake hands and call it a day,” Zollo said.

Cohort ceased supply of SonicWall product at the end of September, but managing director Grahame Smee confirmed the distributor would continue to provide services on behalf of the vendor. Cohort will now throw more weight behind remaining network security vendor partner Stonesoft, he said.

“The product itself was not suitable for our value-add model, but we do a lot of professional services and training on SonicWall and will maintain that,” Smee explained.

SonicWall no longer works with Sphinx following the distributor’s acquisition by Arrow ECS. The split with Cohort leaves it with three UK distributors – Tekdata, Azlan and Bell – although it is rumoured a new relationship with Westcon is in the offing.

Zollo would not be drawn on this, but hinted that a new distributor would be announced in the near future.