Ingram Micro restructures European management team

Johan Vandenbussche and Vincenzo Baggio are out as distributor focuses on five core geographical areas

Ingram's new European president has tweaked his management team as he groups the business into five geographical areas to offer a more localised service.

Gerhard Schulz said the move was to ensure a consistent go-to-market approach and to "empower country operations" that operate close to the business to ensure profitable growth.

Ingram's geographical areas are: the existing DACH group - which incorporates Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Hungary; the Southern Europe group covering France, Italy and Spain with Christian Bittebierre in charge; the Benelux group where Eric Segers has been promoted to vice president Benelux; UK/Ireland which is headed up by Brent McCarty; and Derrick Wood, executive director of Sweden will now report to Schulz.

In addition, Ernesto Schmutter and Sabine Howest have been asked to join the European leadership team, with Schmutter taking the role of executive director of international business and Howest becoming executive director of strategic partner relations and business intelligence Europe.

Vincenzo Baggio and Johan Vandenbussche have both left the company to pursue other opportunities outside Ingram, the firm said.

Schulz said in a statement: "I want to thank them for their valuable contributions and commitment over the past years to our business. I wish them all the best in their careers. With the implementation of this management structure, we take an important step towards our objectives. I am pleased we have such a capable leadership team to support profitable growth across the region."

Baggio said: "I thoroughly enjoyed working with our vendor and international customer community over the years and I want to express my gratitude to my partner development team and the executives within Ingram Micro that supported my execution."

And Vandenbussche added: "It has been a pleasure to work for Ingram Micro during the past 15 years. I enjoyed working with multiple teams in diverse geographies and would like to thank them all for the achievements we had."