As the annual Cisco Partner Summit commences in Boston this week, value-added distributor ScanSource has moved its Cisco practice from the ScanSource Security business unit to a new division called Catalyst.
Called ScanSource Catalyst, it will be positioned as a specialty area for the Greenville, S.C.-based company that will focus on developing voice, video and networking solutions for its channel partners.
Channel partners who work with ScanSource will be offered access to Cisco’s collaboration and networking products under the Catalyst umbrella. Cisco specific resellers will get extra attention from ScanSource that will include specialized team members such as enablement specialists for collaboration products and design engineers for the actual creation solutions.
ScanSource is also providing tools as part of the Catalyst unit that includes the Collaboration FastQuote Tool. This tool helps speed up the quoting process for resellers, as well as internal tools and support to assist the Cisco field sales force.
In addition, ScanSource Catalyst provides complementary solutions from many of its vendor partners and end-to-end collaboration solution. One of the keys to the Catalyst is professional services and resellers will be offered access to network assessments, provisioning, staging and pre-programming of collaboration solutions from ScanSource.
The Catalyst unit is also offering Unified Communications services along with collaboration sales force that is 100 per cent Cisco certified.
Mike Ferney, vice president of merchandising, ScanSource Catalyst said adding Cisco’s collaboration and networking solutions to the ScanSource Catalyst line card is an ideal match for the company’s established expertise and experience in this space.