Ingram Micro hails 'record' Cisco quarter

Distribution giant celebrates after 'record' performance for vendor's Q4 financials

Ingram is celebrating after delivering what it claims is a record-breaking quarterly sales performance in Cisco's fiscal fourth quarter.

The distribution giant's Cisco Business Unit cited strong reseller partner engagement and increased demand generation activities in the mid-market and SMB market, and claimed the results indicate a return to demand-side economic growth.

Julian Thompson, senior director of Ingram's sales and Advanced Solutions, said: "This quarter has seen a significant increase in our sales and engagement with Cisco Premier, Select and Registered partners. We can directly attribute this growth to the implementation of Cisco certified training for our associates in our Advanced Solutions Division.

"As a result of this focus on training, Ingram Micro’s UK sales operation staff now hold a comprehensive range of Cisco qualifications and these enhanced skills are playing a relevant role in helping Cisco partners compete and win in the mid-market and SMB marketplaces.

“Our focus on sales and technical enablement has been recognised with the additional achievement of the Cisco Collaboration Accreditation. Our reseller partners can have the highest confidence that when buying Cisco solutions from Ingram Micro, they are dealing with highly certified and trained sales specialists who can help them grow their Cisco businesses. In partnership with our customers, Ingram Micro continues to contribute to the positive trajectory already being shown in the UK Cisco market as economic conditions begin to identify renewed demand generation opportunities.”

Andy Brocklehurst, regional sales manager for distribution, DMR and velocity at Cisco, added: “Ingram Micro has placed considerable focus around growing Cisco’s business which has had a significant impact this year. Two areas in particular stand out. The first is within our Velocity Partner space which is the fast-moving partner incubation area. The other has been with the specific emphasis on datacentre and virtualisation, where they have exceeded the market growth in every partner certification layer for each and every quarter. Both of these are critical to the success and growth of Cisco in the UK.”