Scenes From The TechSelect Partner Conference

Scenes From TechSelect

Tech Data held its fall TechSelect Partner conference earlier this month at the Red Rock Resort and Casino in Las Vegas for more than 250 VARs. Here's a few scenes from the show.

TechMed Summit

A day before TechSelect kicked off, Tech Data opened its TechMed Partner Summit that brought together more than 50 solution providers focused on the health-care market. Tech Data's heath care business more than doubled in the first half of 2010, compared to the year-ago period. The distributor also announced two new healthcare vendors at the show: JAOtech and Luxnex.

Strategic Health Care

Paula Magnanti, founder and managing principal of Strategic Healthcare Solutions, outlined the meaningful use standards set forth by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act enacted as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and shared sales advice with resellers, such as how to identify the right decision makers and how to evaluate health-care IT deployments.

Having A Ball

The TechMed VARs and vendors spent the night networking in a VIP area of Red Rock Lanes, an onsite bowling alley at the hotel. Luckily for many VARs, they're better at technology than throwing strikes.

For Pete's Sake

Pete Peterson, Tech Data's senior vice president of U.S. sales, kicked off the TechSelect conference, noting that members of the organization represented more than $1.5 billion in sales through Tech Data and grew sales three times as fast as the overall market.

Elvis Is In The Building

To get things started Vegas-style, TechSelect members gathered in their smaller PeerSelect Groups for an Elvis impersonator contest and to design a cape worthy of The King himself. This group designed the "Elvis Cloud."

U2 Can Be Successsful

Artist and speaker Erik Wahl challenged TechSelect members to focus their inner potential, be creative and find new possibilities that exist everywhere. Wahl created a portrait of Bono in a matter of minutes and gave it away to one lucky VAR. He also painted portraits of John Lennon, the Statue of Liberty and Albert Einstein, which were auctioned off to support the TechSelect Host City Charity drive.

CEO's Message

Bob Dutkowsky, Tech Data's CEO, outlined the distributor's strategy for execution, diversification and innovation for TechSelect VARs. He also shared where Tech Data is placing its bets for 2011, in the areas of data center, mobility, consumer electronics, integrated supply chain services and software.

Vendors Speak

A panel of vendor executives gathered to discuss the latest trends and opportunities for their channel partners, touching on everything from the cloud to security to healthcare. From left to right, Dave O’Callaghan, Cisco’s vice president of worldwide commercial sales; Frank Rauch, HP’s vice president of Enterprise Servers, Storage & Networking channel sales; Wilfredo Sotolong, IBM’s vice president of Business Partners and Mid-Market Sales; Mark Bartig, Symantec’s director of Mid-Market; and Joe Quaglia, Tech Data’s senior vice president of U.S. Marketing. Everything Channel's Lisa MacKenzie, at right, moderated the discussion.

Technology Showcase

VARs had a chance to interact with manufacturers' reps during the vendor partner showcase to learn more about the latest solutions and channel programs. Vendors onhand included: Adobe, Avaya, Axiom, Brother, CA, Check Point, Cisco, DYMO, Eaton, Fortinet, HP, IBM, Imation, Konica Minolta, LaCie, Lenovo, Lexmark, LG, Microsoft, NEC, Oracle, Planar, Sony, Symantec, Targus and Wasp.

Super Bowl Of Life

The NFL Network's Rich Eisen, at left, talks with Marty Bauerlein, Tech Data's vice president of West Sales. Eisen spoke about the "Super Bowl of Life" and taking your game to the next level.

Another Artist?

Tech Data's Bauerlein tried to harness his inner artist by taking his turn at some quick onstage art. His message to TechSelect VARs: hugs for purchase orders.

Helping Hand

With the help of an art auction and other donations, TechSelect raised $13,405 for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southern Nevada, a record for the community’s Host City Charity program. From left are Tech Data's Jackie Baron, director of sales planning; Molly Latham, vice president of program services Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southern Nevada; and Tech Data's Bauerlein.