Andrew Sage, Cisco’s new North American distribution head

One week after bumping Julie Hens up to the lead spot in its global distribution management channel, Cisco Systems Inc. has filled the gap she left behind, tapping 14-year Cisco veteran Andrew Sage to be the new vice president for Americas distribution at the networking vendor.

Sage is well known in the channel, having most served as vice president for Cisco’s Worldwide Partner Led unit. Sage has also done time as VP of Worldwide Small Business Sales were he was responsible for leading all aspects of the company’s go to market strategy for Small Business, including channels, field coverage models and sales programs.

Prior to that, he was vice president of Cisco Worldwide Channels Marketing where he was led the company’s channel partner marketing initiatives in close collaboration with the vendor’s central marketing team.

In a blog post penned by Hens and Cisco’s SVP for the Americas Partner Organization, Wendy Bahr, the pair wrote that Sage “built a Partner Led team that created a unique sales go-to-market model and a portfolio of initiatives designed for the strengths of our partners and tightly aligned to Cisco’s Commercial sales teams.”

“Andrew’s team has driven a cohesive strategy, including the launch of programs such as Partner Plus, and has brought to the market a bold message about how we’re targeting midsize customers through our partners, which was a major theme at this year’s Cisco Partner Summit,” Hens and Bahr wrote.

In his new role, Sage will be responsible for all aspects of sales, marketing, operations and logistics for the Americas Distribution Channel, which represents over $6.3 billion in revenue, according to officials.

The move comes one week after Hens, herself a 14-year Cisco veteran with a wealth of channel and distribution experience to her credit, was promoted from her post in Americas distribution to a larger role as the vendor’s new vice president of global distribution.

Hens took over for former global distribution head Scott Brown, who was recently named vice president of the vendor’s APJC partner business group.