Avaya believes its solution provider channel will also have some interest in the store, which offers Avaya’s UC and CC as-a-service options. They also confirmed that this online store is not a direct play.
Jabra resellers get access to a wireless earbud headset that has appeal to consumer product users, but at a much higher quality that is certified for Skype for Business, and which can spare them a long series of support issues compared to the kind of products in this form factor that have been available until now.
Cisco’s collaboration team kicks off a busy Partner Summit with new collaboration dongle for any screen, a smaller room-based telepresence package, and the integration of cloud calling into Webex Teams.
Jabra’s first corded model in their next-gen Engage franchise is aimed at the more price-sensitive part of the market, but still contains some interesting technology innovations.
Zoom sees the expansion of the platform’s capabilities as broadening collaboration conversations for Zoom channel partners, who are a still small, but growing part of their go-to-market strategy.
The newly announced ones are the Voyager 4200 UC, aimed at the ‘corridor warrior,’ and the Savi 8200, which extends the range of the Plantronics line that supports deskphones, mobile phones and PCs. They also recently announced the Elara 60 series, which is a mobile phone station.
CounterPath has added a VAR channel in the last couple years, although the new service will initially launch only through service provider and retail channels, in case any issues need to be worked out.
Texas-based Tango Networks launched their cloud offering in Europe first, but now brings it to the North American market, and are expanding their channel of enterprise-focused partners to help sell it.
Sennheiser is targeting the burgeoning unified collaboration market for headsets with a type of competitor displacement promo which is a first for the company in North America in recent memory.
Lenovo continues their strategy designed to make them a major Smart Office player, with the announcement of their second ThinkSmart offering for the Smart Office, following up their first, which just was released to General Availability.
Sennheiser is looking to their first unified communication and collaboration headset to further stimulate their Canadian business, which has already been showing strong momentum.
Lenovo announces the GA of the Smart Office videoconferencing device, developed in partnership with Microsoft, that was announced last fall at Microsoft’s Ignite event. What they deem more important however, is their message to the market that this product is only the start of an initiative designed to make Lenovo a major player in the Smart Office space.
3CLogic is partnered deeply with a very select number of vendors, one of which is ServiceNow. The new integration lets ServiceNow reps handle all the interaction with 3CLogic phone support through the ServiceNow interface.
Plantronics reworks its channel program to give greater emphasis to implementing their SaaS management solution, and to selling their hardware within broader solutions rather than simply as peripherals.
The Engage franchise, available in models which connect to two and five devices respectively, and in mono, stereo and lightweight convertible models, is designed for dense contact centre environments, and allows for connection of three times as many wireless headsets with no loss of quality.
Mitel is also emphasizing that their acquisition by SearchLight Capital Partners means business as usual for customers and partners, with no change to the company’s leadership, roadmap or channel programs stemming from the deal.
Longtime Westcon exec Corbin is recruited to 8×8 to become old channel chief Chris Peters’ new boss, and talks with ChannelBuzz about his plans to drive the company’s business forward.
Plantronics moves far beyond headsets by buying Polycom, which brings them into three additional businesses that are synergistic to their headset core.
The new technology will roll out later this year in a new service, Avaya Mobile Experience, although Canadians will have to wait a little longer, since it will initially be limited to the U.S.
Zang believes that the seven new updates to Zang Workflow will significantly help the channel, by making it easier for them to build customized applications for their customers.
