Servium poaches DSGi Services head

Steve Dawes joins fast-growing VAR to spearhead its ambitious services growth plans

Servium has nabbed the managed services sales head from Equanet/DSGi Business just weeks after the firm was acquired by Kelway.

Steve Dawes (pictured) has joined the Warrington and Leatherhead-based VAR as director of services to carry out its aggressive plans of growing its services business by 20 per cent in the next two years.

But the firm is plotting a different approach to growth. Rather than recruiting all the skills in-house, Dawes is keen to take a more collaborative approach with other services players.

Speaking to CRN, Dawes, said: “I had a foot in both camps at PC World Business and DSGi Business, and every role I have had has been services-led around annuity-based revenue. Throughout my career I have built up the expertise and ability to engage with customers at all levels.”

He said he had also worked with Servium chief Paul Barlow several times in the past, including at Equanet and Computacenter. “We started talking about two years ago,” he said, “but this clearly has accelerated over the past six months.”

Dawes added: “Coming into Servium, its approach to selling is refreshing – they encourage people go to out and visit customers and adopt a peer-to-peer principle. I will also be having a hands-on role. If we want someone to go and take services to the customer, then I will do it.”

However, he said Servium's services growth plan is not to recruit hordes of sales people, but rather to “foster a collaborative ecosystem of service providers” to supply the services customers need.

“Because we are a smaller organisation we can be a bit more nimble in line with customer demands,” Dawes said. “Rather than bring loads of expensive resource in-house, it makes sense to adopt the collaborative approach. When we get to critical mass, we can then make a decision on how to move forward.”

Barlow added: “We have a great opportunity for growing our services aspect of the business. Steve complements the senior management team and his career pedigree shows his services strength. We now have another heavy hitter on the management team.”