SDG unveils Huawei Enterprise dream team

Experienced channel faces McNish, Li and Watkiss join up as distributor fleshes out ambitious plans for Chinese vendor

Specialist Distribution Group (SDG) has ambitious plans to ramp up its nascent Huawei Enterprise business and is building out dedicated business divisions in the UK, Germany and France.

SDG joined Huawei's UK distribution stable in November, with the agreement also covering the French and Dutch markets. The SCH-owned distributor is now setting up dedicated teams of experienced channel heads in each country.

In the UK, three people have been recruited, with another two "in flight". Former Huawei Symantec exec Wenkan Li has joined the unit, alongside Avnet's Avaya sales head Tony McNish and his former colleague Bev Watkiss.

The division will be overseen by John Taylor as part of his role taking care of new vendors for SDG. The Huawei team will also be backed by the wider SDG sales and back-office operations, said Taylor.

"We are establishing a centre of excellence which will be really strong in solutions architecture, marketing and support capabilities, with strong sales abilities too, so that we can really help resellers drive sales," he added.

SDG has already got out in front of a number of resellers, many from a comms, video or networking background, and other more generalist IT integrators, claimed Taylor.

"You cannot miss Huawei at the moment, and everyone is interested," he said. "This is a really exciting business unit and we expect to grow the business significantly."

Peter Hannah, business unit director for unified communications at Avnet Technology Solutions, was philosophical about the departures of Watkiss and McNish.

"It's inevitable people move around in the channel," he said. "We wish Tony and Bev the very best of luck in their future careers."