Daisy spin-out Allvotec bids farewell to CEO Williams

Boss of acquired ISG Technology Dave Gardner set to take the reins from 14 December

Allvotec's CEO Glen Williams is due to depart the organisation next month after two years helming the Daisy spin-out.

Williams was tapped to head the channel services provider - previously known as Daisy Partner Services - after leading Damovo, which Daisy chairman Matthew Riley sold in 2018.

Allvotec is currently in the process of transitioning between Williams and his successor Dave Gardner, who headed ISG Technology before it was acquired by Allvotec in December last year. He was then made CCO of Allvotec and was made "deputy CEO" in August.

It had been planned that Gardner would succeed Williams at Allvotec since the ISG acquisition, Williams told CRN.

"The plan was always, over time, for Dave to take the reins," he explained.

"When I joined just over two years ago, my job was really to go in and transform businesses and then someone else carries on with that.

"My role was really transformational one; it was to operationally separate the business from Daisy, set up a new brand in the marketplace, reposition us about what we do and to do some acquisitions - which we did with the ISG acquisition. We've nearly completed the transformation of our operations and logistics, so my job is done."

Prior to his time at ISG, Gardner (pictured right) held senior roles at Sopra Steria and Computacenter. This experience wills serve him well in working with channel partners, he told CRN.

"I've got a long-standing career in the channel, from my perspective the strategy doesn't change in terms of everything we've been doing over the last two years and everything that Glen has been leading on has effectively now positioned us to really move into the execution phase," he said.

"It's now about taking everything we've built and really focusing on two things: One is growth, we've seen that the impact of COVID is forcing change and we've been adapting our traditional services since March.

"The other bit is how we focus on the end customer experience. From an operational point of view, it's very much around changing the focus towards the end user experience and helping our channel partners drive that message."

Allvotec also recently appointed former Tech Data exec Gary Withington as its chief sales officer, in a deliberate move to have a leadership team that knows what channel partners need and want, Gardner added.

"One of the things Glen has done in his transformation is to build a really strong leadership team over the last year, not just through the acquisition of ISG but people that he's brought into the business," he said.

The incoming chief exec has no intention of deviating from the growth strategy that has been set out, adding that the priority is organic growth, though he didn't dismiss the potential for inorganic growth.

"You can never say M&A will never be on the table," he said.

"It's not dependent upon driving our strategy but we're always keeping an eye out. Things will come on to our horizon and then they'll either be relevant or they won't, but we're not dependent upon M&A to drive the strategy."

Meanwhile, Williams hinted that he would not be away from the channel for too long and is set to take up another leadership position elsewhere in the New Year.