Exclusive Networks' Tomlin and Eccleston: 'Partners are looking to us for more services'

CRN speaks with Rob Tomlin to find out why he joined the distributor, and heard how Exclusive is honing in on services

Global distributor Exclusive Networks plans to double down on services this year for its channel partners.

In February the company reported a six per cent increase in revenues to €1.5bn (£1.28bn) in its FY23 results.

Gross sales for FY23 were €5.1bn (£4.37bn) up 14 per cent on FY22.

To continue on this growth trajectory, Rob Tomlin, managing director of UK&I and Paul Eccleston, SVP of EMEA outline to CRN their 2024 business priorities.

"The growth of services and growth of enabling services for our channel and vendor partners is key for us," says Eccleston.

"A lot of our vendor partners are looking for us to take up more of the service support requirements for the channel.

"We want to be in a position where we're delivering a consistent level of services for all of our core vendor partners."

Tomlin adds that bolstering its services support is crucial for Exclusive as a cybersecurity specialist.

"I'm seeing from all vendors and all our partners that they all want services support from us.

"Cyber services are key to them. They can't deliver the transformational services our partners' customers require, and our partners need to deliver having the right level of end-to-end services.

"It's a key element to what we do. We have a network operations centre (NOC) and a security operations centre (SOC), and implementation people who deliver everything that we sell.

"They all need that and it's an area of the market that we'll definitely be prioritising."

The UK cybersecurity market is predicted to grow 13 per cent to 15 per cent this year, according to Tomlin.

This means in order to fulfil its growth plans this year, Exclusive needs to help partners achieve that level of growth.

"We also see opportunities to help support MSSP and CSP markets. We've got a number of partners that we already work with, but a lot of those partners are looking to grow their cyber resilience and cybersecurity businesses, and the CSP market in particular, be it in the cloud, or be it through colocation datacentre CSPs, there's great opportunities and we're very focused on that," says Tomlin.

Partner challenges

The way customers consume IT has changed under a tough macro economic environment, which Tomlin says is posing a challenge for partners.

"You've got obviously the cloud economics, the likes of AWS and Azure. Some customers have gone to hyperscale and they've enjoyed some of the benefits of that, some may be retreating or going to a hybrid model."

The UK&I DM says partners are working out that customers don't want to make 3-5 year commitments.

"They need to find a way of analysing their billing.

"That's not necessarily solving an IT problem, but it can't solve an IT problem if they can't construct solutions for the future.

"One of the things I think is an opportunity and a challenge for our partners is, with interest rates the way they are, is creating a way of helping them consume the packaged solutions our vendors won't create and buying on an annual basis.

"I think that payment solutions and finance consumptions are going to be a key differentiator and a challenge for our partners."

Why Tomlin swapped Dell for Exclusive

Tomlin took the channel by surprise in February when it was announced he was leaving Dell after five and a half years for a return to distribution.

Explaining to his job switch, Tomlin tells CRN: "I loved my time at Dell. I learned loads during my time there, like what makes a partner tick and I got to know how to help them grow their business.

"My time was coming towards an end and I was looking to do something different. And anybody who knows me knows I've got a few things that I love.

"I love to build unique cultures for businesses that are unique cultures built upon almost teams that become families.

"I love to build specialist teams that are trusted advisors to their customers. I really love high growth businesses, because there's nothing more soul destroying than running businesses where you've got to consistently cut costs, and reduce workforces, for example. And I love to build businesses that win together.

"So when I look at why I'm here, Exclusive does all the things I value in a company, but at scale.

"It's still a very young company that's grown readily in the last few years. And more importantly, it has a unique culture it's built for many years."

Tomlin's priorities

Only two weeks into his new role, Tomin says his immediate priority is to understand the company.

"As I've been learning and meeting the teams, there's been two or three really common themes that have been clear.

"Our vendors and our customers are all looking for our support to help them identify where the market growth opportunities are, and who the customers they should be focusing are.

"The second key thing is the talent shortage in the market. We need to help our partners and our vendors to support them in resolving that talent shortage especially in the cyber market.

"Cyber is the fastest growing market with double-digit growth and the reality is there's not enough talent in the market, both at an experienced level and then at junior levels coming through to keep a few keep fueling the growth."