CRN Channel Awards 2023: Q&A with Clive Hailstone, managing director, Comstor UK
Clive Hailstone, MD at Comstor UK, discusses the distie's nomination in the CRN UK Channel Awards 2023
Why do you think awards like the Channel Awards matter?
Our colleagues in this remarkable industry should be applauded and the Channel Awards gives us the recognition we deserve. The Channel Awards are the ones we all want to win.
What would winning this award mean to your company?
It means a great deal to be recognised as the best in what we do. Everyone in our great team contribute to our success, and winning as a team makes it more worthwhile. We enjoy a party at Comstor so always happy to celebrate!
What would you say is your compan's proudest achievement over the past year?
Keeping our team motivated and happy despite global challenges with product shortages and FX fluctuation makes me very proud - we've seen remarkably low attrition in our brilliant team. Being the first global distie to have our net zero targets approved by SBTi has been another remarkable achievement in 2023.
What have been the biggest challenges of 2023 so far and how have you overcome them? How have your people helped with that?
$120m stock backlog has brought its challenges! We've done a great deal to reduce the impact: stock investment, streamlining licencing on backlog orders and increased has dramatically reduced backlog for partners
How do you think the channel has changed over the past year and what changes do you think it still needs to make?
The rise of the MSP is changing everything. Increasingly our best partners are switching to selling as a service but changing buying models requires the channel to adapt. Any partner that hasn't made that change will suffer happily we have a team dedicated to supporting growth in this key area and our new hybrid cart marketplace makes the transition so much easier for partners.
What do you see as the main opportunities for the channel in the coming year? How do you plan to capitalise on those opportunities?
The acquisition of Splunk by Cisco creates a huge opportunity for security and resilience in an AI world. As we are 100% focussed on Cisco, Comstor will be at the forefront of bringing this integration to market for our partners. Our other big focus will be continuing to create actionable insights from data to drive new cross and upsell opportunities. As a data first business we've invested heavily in analytics and intelligence to provide powerful insights, helping partners really zoom in and target the best new opportunities.