Channel catch-up: News in brief

Target Components

The distributor has added Verbatim Europe to its vendor roster, handling the firm’s accessories, power and display products.

“We’re delighted to add Verbatim to our vendor portfolio,” said Scott Frankling, marketing and communications manager at Target Components. “It’s a globally recognised brand with a strong heritage and a highly relevant range for today’s channel. This partnership gives our customers access to in-demand products backed by quality and innovation, and we’re excited to drive growth together in the UK market.” 

Everpure

The storage and data management player is supporting BlackBox Hosting, a UK provider of managed private cloud solutions, to provide sovereign cloud options to UK users. There has been increasing growth for services that keep data local and adhere to national compliance standards.

“The risks of inaction on data sovereignty are clear,” said Paddy Fitzpatrick, vice-president and general manager UK&I at Everpure. “Service disruption, data breaches, regulatory penalties, and financial or reputational damage are all top of mind. We’re excited to support BlackBox Hosting with its sovereign cloud offerings at a time when UK businesses are actively looking for solutions that can mitigate risk in an increasingly uncertain business and geopolitical landscape.”

Also

The distributor is expanding its partnership with Dropbox to six more countries across EMEA, with the UK joined by France, Spain, Portugal, Benelux and Italy. The vendor’s portfolio will be available on Also Cloud Marketplace.

“We are pleased to further strengthen our strategic partnership with Dropbox by extending our collaboration into additional regions,” said Artjoms Krūmiņš, group lead of CoC software and cyber security at Also.

“Building on a strong foundation, this expansion broadens our market reach, strengthens Also’s portfolio and further enhances the value we deliver to partners and customers across EMEA. Together with Dropbox, we are well-positioned to support the evolving needs of the market and help partners capture new growth opportunities.”

Peer Software

The firm has launched its enhanced partner programme, with the aim of supporting its channel base with access to more resources targeted around key verticals.

“Today’s enterprises need partners who understand modern data challenges and can architect solutions for scale, performance and intelligent automation,” said Roger Austin, vice-president of alliances and channel at Peer Software.

“Our enhanced partner programme equips resellers and strategic alliances to help customers navigate expanding hybrid environments across the edge, datacentre and public cloud. As file data grows more distributed, organisations face increasing complexity in synchronising, protecting and collaborating on it. 

Brother UK

The vendor is looking to its channel partners to take its latest A4 cloud laser printer out to market, giving the SME customer base an opportunity to embrace colour. The print player believes there is a significant volume of customers that would benefit from laser devices that have been designed for SME customers.

Greig Millar, chief revenue officer at Brother UK, said the firm is arming partners with an offering that would go down well with users, stating: “We’re seeing a shift in how businesses are printing, and colour is playing an increasingly important role for SMEs.

“While overall print volumes may be changing, the documents worth printing need to work harder – be that customer-facing materials, reports and presentations, or even internal communications. If it’s worth printing, businesses want it printed in colour.”

Isaca

The professional organisation focused on digital trust has introduced the Advanced in AI Risk (AAIR) certification that will appeal to those working across audit, risk, security, privacy and compliance areas.

Chris Dimitriadis, chief global strategy officer at Isaca, said: “The enthusiasm to adopt AI has outpaced the skills to govern it. Many organisations cannot tell you how quickly they could stop an AI system, who is accountable if it goes wrong, or how they would explain a failure to a regulator. That is not a technology problem – it is a governance and skills problem.”