Cisco Exec Leaves To Run Channel Development At Polycom
Patrick Piwowarczyk, who was senior director of global market engagement and enablement at Cisco Systems, has left the networking giant to boost the channel charge at unified communications and collaboration competitor Polycom.
Piwowarczyk is now head of channel development in the Americas for San Jose, Calif.-based Polycom.
"I have long admired [Polycom] and I am thrilled that I will have the opportunity to help solve partners' collaboration needs," said Piwowarczyk in a LinkedIn post. "Channel partners play a pivotal role in delivering best-in-class collaboration solutions for our customers and I look forward to developing those relationships with our channel."
Piwowarczyk was focused on driving revenue growth, profitability, operational effectiveness and the customer and partner experience at Cisco, according to his LinkedIn profile. He was also senior director of Cisco's go-to-market business capabilities and global business sales operations for nearly four years.
Over his 20-year career, he has held top U.S. channel sales roles for networking vendors such as D-Link and 3Com, which was acquired by Hewlett-Packard in 2010 for $2.7 billion.
Following Polycom's acquisition by private equity firm Siris Capital Group last year, the vendor has hired a slew of new leaders including CEO Mary McDowell, who was previously an executive partner at the New York-based private equity firm.
In May, the company hired Tarun Loomba as executive vice president of solutions management. Loomba was previously general manager and vice president of computing storage solutions at SanDisk, where he ran the company's multibillion-client solid state drive and custom flash division.
Gary Berzack, CTO and COO of New York-based eTribeca, a networking solution provider and Polycom partner, said he was optimistic Piwowarczyk will help improve Polycom's channel message.
"On the channel side, it needs a lot of work -- Polycom has got to clear up its message," said Berzack. "Polycom has to redefine itself in this digital network and cloud convergence, while still maintaining some forms of hardware. In the light of both being taken private and the Avaya bankruptcy conversions, it's a true challenge to redefine what video and voice should look like and be priced at for integrators to continue to make margin in the next two to five years."