5 Companies That Came To Win This Week

The Week Ending July 10

This week's roundup of companies that came to win includes IBM's groundbreaking 7-nanometer microprocessor, Cisco's appointment of a respected channel veteran to be the company's new channel chief, the ambitious channel plans for EMC spinoff Syncplicity, and savvy hires by solution provider PCM and IT infrastructure services vendor Curvature.

Not everyone in the IT industry was making smart moves this week, of course. For a rundown of companies that were unfortunate, unsuccessful or just didn't make good decisions, check out this week's Five Companies That Had A Rough Week roundup.

IBM Develops Breakthrough 7-Nanometer Chip

IBM may be having its struggles, but this week the company reminded us that it remains a leading technology developer.

IBM said Thursday that it had built an ultra-dense, 7-nanometer processor that delivers four times the compute power that's available today. The processor uses transistors that are only about three times larger than a strand of human DNA, will be used to power a variety of products including the company's Watson supercomputer, mainframes and cloud data centers.

IBM said it has earmarked $3 billion in research and development spending over the next five years to bring the chips to market.

Syncplicity Set Free, Charts Aggressive Channel Course

EMC this week said it would spin off its Syncplicity unit, selling the file-sync-and-sharing business to private equity firm Skyview Capital for an undisclosed sum.

The move is seen as helping Syncplicity better realize its potential: Synplicity CEO Jonathan Huberman told CRN that being part of the giant EMC "somewhat hampered" Syncplicity's prospects.

Huberman especially wins kudos for his stated intention to expand Synplicity's channel efforts and partner with solution providers "in a more aggressive fashion."

PCM Hires Top Zones Execs, Reorganizes Sales For Accelerated Growth

PCM has reorganized its sales operations to better drive sales around advanced solutions. And the big solution provider has hired a pair of former executives at Zones, a PCM rival, to help oversee that effort.

PCM has hired former Zones executive Tom Ducatelli, who will take over as PCM's executive vice president of commercial sales later this month. Ducatelli was executive vice president of sales and business development at Zones until earlier this year.

Last month PCM hired Anne Wilcox to serve as the company's new senior vice president of marketing. Wilcox was Zones' chief marketing officer until January 2013.

Curvature Taps Dell, HP Vet To Boost Channel Strategy

PCM isn't the only company making savvy hires. CRN learned this week that IT infrastructure services provider Curvature has hired Linda York to be the company's vice president of global services and channels.

York has more than 35 years experience working for Dell and Hewlett-Packard. York told CRN that she plans to ramp up Curvature's networking services arm to include more vendors and provide more opportunities for the channel.

SurveyMonkey Hires Former HP COO As New CEO And completing the trifecta of savvy hires this week was SurveyMonkey's hiring of former Hewlett-Packard chief operating officer Bill Veghte to be the company's new CEO. Veghte assumes the post at the online survey and polling company effective Aug. 3. Veghte was a five-year HP veteran who was once seen as a potential heir to HP CEO Meg Whitman. He takes the CEO post held by Dave Goldberg who died in a tragic accident earlier this year.