Avnet Technology Solutions

A strong pipeline of opportunities is the cornerstone of success for all businesses. Is your pipeline flowing as well as you would like? Spending time identifying the “right” way to create demand often falls by the wayside due to the need to focus on the immediate deals in front of you. That’s where we can help!

Avnet’s Demand Creation team can help you develop marketing tactics that align to your business goals, and in turn, help you sell more data center technologies into high-growth vertical markets. Our team of experienced marketing strategists leverage a variety of proven approaches to feed your sales pipeline and deliver an excellent return on investment.

Avnet offers a wide variety of proven demand creation programs and services, tailored to meet and exceed your specific marketing goals.

Avnet’s arsenal of proven demand creation programs includes:

• Account and Industry Profiling
• Campaign and Program Development
• Content and Creative Development
• Database Management
• Email and Direct Mail
• Event Planning and Support
• Executive Door Openers
• Landing Pages, Blogs and Webinar Design
• Lead Nurturing and Distribution
• List Acquisition and Management
• Prospecting Strategies
• Search Engine Optimization
• Target Market Analysis
• Telemarketing
• Vertical Programs
• And more!

Hula Networks, Inc., a Mountain View, California reseller, recently engaged Avnet Demand Creation Services. Here’s how they described their experience:

“The combined efforts with Avnet/Market Resource Partners and Hula have already generated several true opportunities and formed a pipeline for Q1 and Q2 2012. The lines of communication has been excellent, which keeps everyone in the loop and knowledgeable about progress and current deals. I am very excited to have the opportunity to work with such a great team, and am highly motivated to continue the success,” said Scott J. Hobin, Technology Efficiency Specialist, Hula Networks, Inc.

Did You Know that Avnet's Demand Creation team:

• Creates more than 500 end-user demand generation campaigns annually
• Distributes 14,500 leads each year
• Helps achieve $100 million in sales (FY11)
• Generates $500 million in Marketing Pipeline (FY11)
• Returns excellent ROI: For every dollar spent on demand creation activities through Avnet, the average ROI is 32:1*

*ROI is calculated by marketing pipeline and industry average conversion rates plus sales out data divided by total spend.

If you are interested in learning more about how Avnet can help solve your demand creation needs, please contact your Avnet sales representative.

Jessica Truman / Marketing Project Leader / (210) 247-1313

Avnet Introduces End-to-End SolutionsPath Engagement Service!

This week the curtain dropped to reveal Avnet's SolutionsPath® Engagement Service to the industry. This new strategic consulting service for partners in the U.S. and Canada provides a business growth model based on Avnet’s unique, proven SolutionsPath® methodology.

By engaging with Avnet for this service, partners will evolve from accessing Avnet’s resources in an à la carte manner to creating a complete business plan with measurable goals and mutual accountability. Avnet will work with participating partners to develop profitable growth plans for designing, selling and delivering data center solutions in high-growth vertical markets such as banking, energy, government, healthcare and retail. Participating partners will also increase the depth of their industry expertise and breadth of data center solutions competencies.

“Industry research clearly indicates that CIOs and IT executives strongly prefer to work with solution providers that understand their specific industries and business challenges,” said Gavin Miller, vice president of Solutions Marketing and Development, Avnet Technology Solutions, Americas. “Avnet’s success with our SolutionsPath methodology has proven that by developing expertise in high-growth vertical markets, our partners can grow their businesses at a faster rate than the industry average. We have now created a complete engagement model that leverages Avnet’s multi-million dollar annual investment in consultants, business intelligence tools, planning services and resources into a long-term growth process for our partners. The SolutionsPath Engagement Service aligns market-specific research, planning, training and enablement, and professional services with measurable goals and mutually agreed-upon outcomes to bring even greater success to our partners.”

Read the full Avnet press release.

Current Avnet partners can request a personalized briefing about the SolutionsPath Engagement Service by contacting their Avnet account manager.

Maureen O'Leary / Director Communications / 480-794-6152

Avnet Technology Solutions Americas, and Avnet Electronics Marketing Americas—each Avnet, Inc. business regions—have together introduced Brilliant Digital Signage Suite of Services, a complete package of digital signage solutions for embedded and data center vertical market applications. Combining Avnet’s hardware, software and technical expertise, Avnet’s Brilliant Digital Signage Suite of Services offers original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and value-added resellers (VARs) complete end-to-end solutions for propelling digital display projects to market faster - turning everyday digital signage into results-generating marketing solutions for end customers.

By 2015, Intel estimates that approximately 22 million digital signs will be powered by 10 million media players globally*. Retail and “quick-serve” restaurants are just two of the market areas fueling this growth for digital signage. To generate impactful results from all of those digital displays, marketers will need to engage with technology experts to find innovative ways to leverage this growing technology to reach consumers.

Avnet’s Brilliant Digital Signage Suite of Services includes:

• Site Survey and Installation
• Custom Integration
• Content Management
• On-site Service Level Agreements and Extended Warranties
• Financing
• Asset Recovery (Disposal/Refurbish)
• Technical Expertise

As one of the world’s largest distributors of electronic components, embedded technology, and computer and IT solutions, Avnet combines its supply- and design-chain expertise and takes it a step further by offering a comprehensive line of services for any digital signage project with Brilliant Digital Signage Suite of Services. With industry-leading hardware and software from suppliers including AOpen, Intel, Microsoft, NEC, Popstar Networks, and Samsung, Avnet provides integrated digital display solutions for applications in retail, hospitality, healthcare and transportation.

To learn more, please visit http://www.brilliantdigitalsignage.com or read more here: Avnet Press Release, Vertical Systems Reseller article.

* Jose Avalos, Intel. Blog post on Digital Signage Today

Maureen O'Leary / Director Communications / 480-794-6152

Mellanox Technologies (NASDAQ: MLNX, TASE: MLNX) is a
leading supplier of end-to-end InfiniBand and Ethernet connectivity
solutions and services for servers and storage. Mellanox products
optimize data center performance and deliver industry-leading bandwidth, scalability, power conservation and cost-effectiveness while converging multiple legacy network technologies into one future-proof architecture. The company offers innovative solutions that address a wide range of markets including HPC, enterprise,
mega warehouse data centers, cloud computing, financial
services, Internet and Web 2.0.

Key Markets:
• Enterprise Data Center: EDCs are facilities that house servers, storage, communications infrastructure equipment and embedded systems that enable deployment of commercial applications such as customer relationship management, financial trading and risk management applications, enterprise resource planning and ecommerce and Web service applications. EDCs typically provide multiple data processing and storage resources to one or many organizations and are capable of supporting several applications at the same time.

• High-Performance Computing: HPC encompasses applications that utilize the computing power of advanced parallel processing over multiple servers, commonly called a supercomputer. The expanding list of HPC applications includes financial modeling, government research, computer automated engineering, geoscience and bioscience research, and digital content creation. HPC systems typically focus data processing and storage resources on one application at a time.

• Embedded: Embedded applications encompass computing, storage and communication functions that use interconnect solutions contained in a chassis which has been optimized for a particular environment. Examples of embedded applications include storage and data acquisition equipment, military operations, industrial and medical equipment and telecommunications and data communications infrastructure equipment.

Awards and Accolades
• May 2011 Mellanox SX1036 36-port 40GbE Switch Named "Best of Interop" Finalist
• Feb 2011 Storage Magazine "Product of the Year" - Silver Medal - Network Equipment Category
• Nov 2010 HPCwire’s Readers’ Choice Awards - Best HPC interconnect product or technology
• April 2010 "Best of Interop" 2010: Server and Storage Category

In Q2 Avnet resellers grew the Mellanox business substantially year over year. To learn more about Mellanox and how you can grow your business, please contact your regional Avnet sales representative:

James Higgins, Inside Sales Rep-West
Kevin Flaherty, Inside Sales Rep-Central
Fione Williams, Inside Sales Rep-East

Terri Thomas / Senior Marketing Project Leader / 480-794-2561

Avnet RetailPath® University
February 21-22, 2012 | Colorado

Are you looking to accelerate your success in the Retail industry?

RetailPath University offers an in-depth training curriculum designed to give you the necessary information to effectively sell into retail end users and get your share of the projected $41.6 billion retail IT spend.

Topics Addressed:
• In-depth insight into the challenges and opportunities of the retail industry’s multi-channel environment
• Hands-on knowledge of new and emerging technologies that are driving new sales opportunities
• Expanding consumer touch points and enabling next-generation buying trends

Early Bird Special and Vail Resorts Drawing!
Now, when you take advantage of our Early Bird special and register before January 27, you will also be entered into a drawing for two 2-day lift tickets at one of the Vail Resorts Mountains—what a perfect opportunity to extend your trip to RetailPath University into a vacation!

Click here for more information and to see the Official Rules and Conditions.

Early Bird Specials:
$599 for first company attendee
$449 for additional company registrants

After January 25, standard pricing will apply:
$799 for first company attendee
$599 for additional company registrants

Register Now!

Questions? Contact solutionspathtraining@avnet.com.

Jessica Truman / Marketing Project Leader / (210) 247-1313

On January 9, Avnet announced two new demo resources for Cisco partners in Canada. The Cisco Data Center Lab near Toronto will allow partners to demonstrate Cisco Unified Computing Systems B-Series and Cisco Unified Computing Systems C-Series servers to their customers in a variety of data center environments. The Cisco Customer Test Drive Program helps partners pilot these Cisco solutions in their customers' own data centers. Both resources help accelerate partners’ sales cycle for Cisco data center solutions. Read the full Avnet press release here.

“Because of the investments we have made in these Cisco demonstration resources, Avnet’s partners can quickly and cost-effectively capture sales and profitably grow their businesses,” said Brian Aebig, vice president and general manager, Avnet Technology Solutions, Canada. “Avnet’s new Cisco Data Center Lab and Customer Test Drive Program are extremely effective in the sales process because partners can let their customers experience first-hand the power of Cisco’s data center solutions. By using these demonstration resources, partners can collaborate with customers as they ‘try out’ the solutions they are interested in and ensure they align exactly with their business needs and requirements.”

To learn more about this unique Canadian Partner opportunity please contact Christine Johnson, manager, Solutions Marketing and Development in Canada at (905) 812-4572.

Maureen O'Leary / Director Communications / 480-794-6152

Cover each product sale with attached services to increase margins!

According to IDC*, “Short implementation time + Faster ROI will continue to drive demand for end-customer consulting services.” Avnet’s implementation services can help you get your customers up and running correctly and speed time to deployment—while increasing your margins.

For example, Avnet Implementation Services for NetApp offers you a 20 percent services margin when you attach services to each product sale. With this service, Avnet provides our partners:

• A comprehensive portfolio of NetApp installation, implementation and configuration services
• Fully certified NetApp engineers and consultants
• Expertise across the entire NetApp hardware line
• Easy services ordering using packaged offerings and SKU numbers
• Project managers to ensure fast, efficient and effective delivery of high-quality services

Avnet Data Center Lifecycle Services are designed to help you expand revenue-generating opportunities beyond the product sale. With our ever-broadening services portfolio, Avnet services span the full data center lifecycle — from planning, acquisition, and integration — to deployment, management, and asset disposition.

Let us help you fill technical, business or geographic gaps and broaden your services portfolio. For more information about Avnet implementation services and other Avnet services, please visit our website.

*IDC Predictions 2011: More Signs of Life in the Global Services Market Worldwide.

Kathy Schauer / Director, Solutions Marketing / (480) 794-6470