Northamber, Nuvias and Tech Data add to vendor rosters

Lenovo’s Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG) has added Northamber to its list of UK and Ireland distributors as it looks to widen its channel reach.

Northamber joins Tech Data and Arrow and will be offering the vendor’s range of servers, storage and solutions products, with a brief to reach out to those partners that serve the small and mid-size customer bases.

“This year, we are evolving Lenovo’s distribution strategy,” said Ian Jeffs, general manager at Lenovo ISG. “Our existing distributors support some of the UK’s biggest blue-chip companies, public sector organisations, and AI [artificial intelligence] and solutions specialists. Working in collaboration with Northamber, we can collaborate with even more partners supporting growing businesses throughout the UK.

“Lenovo ISG’s ambition is to become one of the UK’s top three IT infrastructure solution companies. Evolving our distribution strategy will allow us to support the channel better and help more partners access our technology solutions,” he added.

For Northamber, the relationship will bring on board a heavyweight hardware brand and give it the opportunity to offer the vendor’s products to a well-established reseller base.

“Lenovo ISG’s ambition is to become one of the UK’s top three IT infrastructure solution companies. Evolving our distribution strategy will allow us to support the channel better and help more partners access our technology solutions”

“Northamber is delighted to be working with Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions Group. Northamber’s heritage was built on distributing server and storage into SMBs and the mid-market; the addition of Lenovo’s portfolio and its clear commitment to the SMB channel will allow us to bring an exciting new offering to this space through our loyal partners,” said Northamber managing director Alex Phillips.

Elsewhere in the channel, the theme has been around security, with Nuvias and Tech Data adding to their vendor portfolios.

Nuvias, fresh from its acquisition of Cloud Distribution last week, has signed a deal to handle Deep Instinct’s product line and take the threat detection tools out to its reseller base.

“Supporting emerging technologies aligns with Nuvias’s extended area of focus and intercepts growth opportunities to the benefit of both vendors and partners. The cyber security market holds a lot of promise in terms of growth and innovation, and we are committed to supporting both in collaboration with Deep Instinct,” said David Harvey, vice-president of vendor alliances at Nuvias Group.

Graham Howton, channel and MSSP manager at Deep Instinct, said it was looking to build a loyal and robust channel across Europe. “We’re 100% committed to the channel model and are certain that Nuvias, with its deep cyber security experience and pan-European reach, is the ideal partner for us at a time of meteoric growth in our business,” he said.

Over at Tech Data, a freshly inked relationship with Proofpoint sees the distributor taking its email security products out to existing partners and managed service providers (MSPs), as well as helping expand the partner base.

Alison Nixon, business unit director for security at Tech Data, UK and Ireland, said the Proofpoint products would help partners protect customers as they deal with increased remote working and a greater number of threats.

“With hybrid working dominating the agenda, organisations need to tighten control over email and user behaviour. They need to keep a close eye on messaging and equip employees to spot the danger signs and take appropriate action. Ideally, the customer wants someone to take all that off their hands – and that’s especially true of SMBs,” said Nixon.

“With the expertise and support of our security team, and Proofpoint’s solutions, MSPs can help their customers counter all potential email-borne cyber threats. It’s an exceptional combination and an excellent opportunity,” she added.

Warwick Lawson-Syer, director of channel sales at Proofpoint, said: “Tech Data has a thriving security business practice and tremendous penetration of the SMB-focused reseller community. As such, it is ideally placed to reach out to more MSPs and resellers and support them in getting enabled while delivering first-class protection to address the needs of businesses facing a fast-evolving threat landscape.”