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GTDC: Distribution key to AI success
If artificial intelligence tools and services are going to grow, distribution with its delivery and enablement skills is going to be a significant part of the equation
Artificial intelligence (AI), security and cloud all featured heavily at the GTDC Summit EMEA conference as distributors got together to discuss their current and future prospects.
The Global Technology Distribution Council used the event to underline the critical function its members served to both vendor and partner communities.
There was a sense that the investments and innovations made by disties in the past couple of years to develop their own cloud marketplaces and adopt AI tools to generate market insights had put the community in a strong position.
The growth in popularity of AI has put distribution in a key position to support the roll-out of the technology across the channel.
“The IT landscape changes rapidly, and AI is escalating that transformation towards a digital-centric future,” said Frank Vitagliano, chief executive officer of GTDC.
GTDC has been consistently promoting the message that vendors need to work more closely with distribution to get their technologies into the hands of more people, and that was most important with AI.
“Technology vendors and hyperscalers are more reliant on the reach, resources and drive of distribution than ever before, especially with the increasing complexities of cloud and AI-focused solutions,” he said. “Distributors continue to build and expand upon their core capabilities to help partners adapt and scale digital technologies across the IT ecosystem.”
Importance of distribution
Stressing the importance of distribution was a theme echoed by other speakers at the event, who agreed that more resellers would adopt and sell AI with the enablement from disties.
Joe Turner, vice-president of research for Context, said that along with AI, the need to deliver security also continued to be a focus for the channel. “As we move into an era where autonomous agents have full access with the power to trigger transactions and move data, identity protection and zero trust can’t be treated as an afterthought,” he said.
Context research into how Q1 fared for distributors indicated strong growth in identity and access management along with zero trust solutions. “Distributors have effectively become the compliance and talent shock absorbers for the channel,” said Turner. “They are the only ones capable of bridging the 2026 ‘readiness gap’ by providing the technical certifications and explainable AI guardrails that solution providers need to deliver secure, legally compliant innovation to their customers at a local level.”
Sessions at the event underlined the importance of developing digital platforms along with integrating AI into more of those efforts.
An increasing number of distributors, including the likes of Westcon-Comstor and TD Synnex, are focusing on the data their systems generate to feedback to resellers, and MSPs’ opportunities around licence renewals and potential upselling chances.
Industry veteran and IT consultant Alex Tatham was among those leading panels to examine the impact agentic AI would have on the channel, where it could benefit and expose risks to ensure the industry remained ahead of the curve.
Numerous examples were shared from senior distribution leaders, from a wide range of players including Ingram Micro and Arrow, to underline the positive impact AI was already delivering in the channel.
