Robert Stockford appointed to lead strategic drive into key growth sector of the market
Basingstoke, 18 October 2016 – Azlan, the enterprise value added distribution business of Tech Data, has brought together the expertise from across the whole UK business to form a specialist Security business unit that will focus in driving growth in this key area as customers make the transition to highly virtualised and hybrid infrastructures.
It has appointed Robert Stockford as head of the new practice and from day-one has a team of 20 dedicated and specialist staff, drawn from within Azlan along with ten new recruits who have recently joined the company. This brings deep expertise and experience in key vendors such as Cisco, IBM, Landesk, McAfee, Sonicwall, Symantec, Veritas, VMware and BlackBerry/Good Technology, together into a single, coherent team.
As Security Business Unit Manager, Stockford will be responsible for devising and executing Azlan’s market strategy in this vital segment of the market. He joined Azlan in July 2016, specifically to work on the development of Azlan UK’s security value proposition, having joined from Forcepoint, where he was Director of Channel Sales.
According to an estimate by Markets and Markets (www.marketsandmarkets.com), the total cyber security market worldwide is estimated to grow from $122.45 billion in 2016 to $202.36 billion by 2021, at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.6 percent1. This includes all solutions and services and both on-premise and cloud delivery.
“With more customers now looking to make the most of virtualised and hyper-converged infrastructures, software-defined solutions and cloud-based appliances and services to enable much more flexible, scalable and networks and mobile environments, the need for expert advice and professional services on security has never been greater”, said Stockford.
“By bringing together the skills and experience we had within Azlan and Tech Data, and the new team we have brought in as well, Azlan is providing the specialist support and professional services that will allow resellers to address the security challenges faced by end users and the opportunities that presents for resellers. We will also draw on the expertise we have in virtualised data centre, workspace mobility and data management, to create coherent, joined-up propositions that address the whole spectrum of security needs, across platforms, networks and devices or all kinds.”
With the new Security business unit in place, Azlan is ready to implement its strategic plans for the year ahead, said Rob Tomlin, Managing Director of Azlan UK.
“Security is the one key strategic area in which we needed to ensure we had a clear and defined focus. We now have the team and the partnerships in place and, combined with our unrivalled capability and scale, we’re ready to execute on our strategic plans, build business for our partners and become a real force in this important sector of the market. We’ll be looking to extend our portfolio and drive growth with a set of credible, reliable and scalable solutions and services, and a clearly differentiated approach in the value distribution sector.”
Azlan will be looking to work closely with expert security resellers and systems integrators and leverage its strength in other sectors of the market to accelerate security solutions and services sales as part of integrated propositions. As well as solutions and services, it will offer specialist support and consultancy to help converged solutions resellers and managed services providers enhance and extend their propositions.
Picture: Robert Stockford, Azlan.
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Notes
1 – Source: Cyber Security Market by Solutions (IAM, Encryption, DLP, UTM, Antivirus/Antimalware, Firewall, IDS/IPS, Disaster Recovery), Services, Security Type, Deployment Mode, Organization Size, Vertical & Region – Global Forecast to 2021, published in July 2016 – see http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/Market-Reports/cyber-security-market-505.html,
About Azlan
Azlan, the Enterprise Division of Tech Data Corporation, is a leading value-added distributor of networking, communications, midrange and enterprise servers, storage, software and unified communications solutions. For more information see www.azlan.com. Tech Data Corporation is one of the world’s largest wholesale distributors of technology products, services and solutions. Its advanced logistics capabilities and value added services enable 115,000 resellers to efficiently and cost effectively support the diverse technology needs of end users in more than 100 countries. Tech Data generated $27.7 billion in net sales for the fiscal year ended January 31, 2015. It is ranked No. 111 on the Fortune 500® and one of Fortune’s “World’s Most Admired Companies.” To learn more, visit www.techdata.com or follow on Facebook and Twitter.
For more information please contact:
Sara Gemmell
Azlan UK Marketing Director
Tel: 07905 736798