Exertis gets the nod from Dell EMC
Exertis and Hammer jointly awarded rights to full portfolio in UK
Exertis and its daughter brand Hammer have survived a global distribution cull by Dell EMC, winning rights to its full portfolio in the UK.
Dell EMC kicked off a global rationalisation process before Christmas after admitting it was over-distributed following in the wake of the $67bn merger. At the time it had over 300 distributors globally.
Although global players learned their fate last month, Exertis and its Hammer subsidiary had to wait until Friday for confirmation that they had retained rights to Dell's enlarged enterprise portfolio in the UK, including the EMC offering.
Exertis and Hammer both held Dell distribution rights before their union last October, and the duo have been jointly awarded the new contract, with Hammer now set to take on more dedicated Dell EMC heads at its Basingstoke office.
Talking to CRN, Exertis' IT sales and commercial director Phil Brown (pictured) claimed Exertis could offer Dell EMC resellers something different from its global competitors.
"We submitted as a joint effort [with Hammer] and got notification on Friday morning that for the UK the combined entities of Exertis and Hammer have got access to the full Dell EMC portfolio," he confirmed. "From the existing Exertis business we already had client and server-storage from Dell, and Hammer had Dell as well, so we've got the addition of the EMC portfolio to it.
"We've got a history of working with [Dell]. We bought their CTO [configure to order] programme to life and are still one of the only distributors that are able to deliver that. We understand how Dell work in the channel. With our recent acquisition of Hammer, our reach into the reseller base is wide. With Hammer's vertical propositions and their specialist nature, and our broader reach into the reseller base, we as a combined proposition have an edge over our competitors."
Jason Beason, commercial director at Hammer, said the server and storage specialist has a heritage of bringing net new business to the vendors it works with, and said Hammer would do the same for Dell EMC.
"It's important that we create new resellers, rather than the switching of anything. We will come to them with new opportunities - it's important we do that in the early days," he said.
The appointment, along with the Hammer acquisition and the recent appointment of channel veteran Kevin Matthews as enterprise sales director, shows that Exertis "is continuing to invest in its enterprise offering", Brown added.
Brett Edgecombe, managing director of storage VAR 101 Data Solutions, welcomed the fact that Dell EMC partners now have more clarity over the distribution line up. His firm has traditionally used Avnet for EMC and Exertis for Dell.
"It's great news that we are finally getting some structure within the Dell-EMC channel. We were already putting a significant amount of Dell business through Exertis, so this opens up a good competitive landscape," he said.
Exertis' confirmation in the Dell EMC line-up comes three weeks after Dell EMC unveiled their first joint channel programme, which categorises reseller partners as Gold, Platinum, Titanium and Titanium Black.
Edgecombe said he approved of the renewed scheme.
"Dell EMC listened to us and others on things like not having to go through multiple portals to do different things. We have gone in at Gold leve and certainly have aspirations to move up the ladder," he said.