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Hires New Vice President of Vertical Market Solutions and Targets Data Center Opportunities in the Banking, Energy/Utilities and Retail Industries
TEMPE, Ariz. -- Avnet Technology Solutions, the solutions distribution leader and an operating group of Avnet, Inc. (NYSE: AVT), is expanding its vertical market strategy to generate new growth opportunities related to the data center for its North American solution providers. Michael Houghton has been hired as vice president of Vertical Market Solutions for Avnet Technology Solutions, Americas. He will be responsible for the strategic direction and growth of Avnet's new vertical market segments in banking, energy/utilities and retail.
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| Michael Houghton |
"Avnet is taking our industry-leading SolutionsPath® methodology from our highly successful HealthPath® and GovPath® vertical market offerings and expanding it into the high growth markets of banking, energy/utilities and retail," said Tony Vottima, senior vice president, Solutions Marketing and Development, Avnet Technology Solutions, Americas. "We believe our strategy of enabling value-added reseller specialization will yield continued high-growth results for our partners as it has for the past four years. Our goal is to continue to improve the capabilities of our partners and help them leverage those skills to solve the IT problems facing their customers. We want to enable them to become trusted advisors so they can address all their customers' IT needs by having the vertical market expertise that sets them above their competition."
Avnet is making strategic investments in support of these three new vertical markets, and the practices will be formally launched by the end of this year. Avnet hired Houghton to oversee the development of these new specialized SolutionsPath practices. He joins Avnet from Direct Alliance Corp., a business process outsourcing provider that serves Fortune 500 clients across a variety of industries.
"We've sent more than 75 people to Avnet's HealthPath and GovPath Universities, and are actively participating in the SolutionsPath practices focused on data center technologies as well," said Jeff Teeter, vice president of vertical solutions at Logicalis. "Avnet's SolutionsPath practices helped us create and deliver market-relevant technology solutions that address business needs and enabled us to strengthen our position as a strategic business advisor for our clients. As a result, we've experienced growth of more than 30 percent in those focused markets during the past year. I look forward to seeing what they have planned for these new vertical markets and will certainly take advantage of them."
Avnet has identified the banking, energy/utilities and retail markets as growth opportunities for solutions providers based on extensive market research and its own sales volumes. Avnet has seen double-digit channel sales growth in banking and utilities during the past year. All three of these markets represent untapped opportunities for Avnet's solution providers, with the 2010 total available market for North American technology sales equaling $54 billion for banking, $20 billion for energy/utilities and $40.1 billion for retail, with 2009-2014 CAGRs at 5.7 percent, 4.5 percent and 5.1 percent, respectively.1
"Gartner has identified banking, energy/utilities and retail as strong growth markets for the technology channel," said Tiffani Bova, vice president of research for the IT Marketing and Channel Strategies Group at Gartner. "Value-added resellers and distributors who understand the nuances of these markets can differentiate themselves from other providers by offering business-focused and vertically relevant solutions and services. Building training and enablement, which can help channel partners target the right customers with the right solutions at a lower total cost-of-sale, is a winning combination for growth."
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About Avnet Technology Solutions
As a global solutions distributor, Avnet Technology Solutions collaborates with its customers and suppliers to create and deliver effective solutions that address the business challenges of their end-user customers locally and around the world. For fiscal year 2009, the group served customers in more than 30 countries and generated US $7.04 billion in annual revenue. Avnet Technology Solutions (www.ats.avnet.com) is an operating group of Avnet, Inc.
About Avnet
Avnet, Inc. (NYSE: AVT), a Fortune 500 company, is one of the largest distributors of electronic components, computer products and embedded technology in the world. Avnet accelerates its partners' success by connecting the world's leading technology suppliers with a broad base of more than 100,000 customers and providing cost-effective, value-added services and solutions. For the fiscal year ended June 27, 2009, Avnet generated revenue of $16.23 billion. For more information, visit www.avnet.com.
1 Source: Gartner, April 2010 (Forecast Pivot Table: Enterprise IT Spending by Vertical Industry Market, Worldwide, 2008-2014)
Contacts
Brodeur Partners, for Avnet
Sonia Bovio, 602-224-4048
sbovio@brodeur.com
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