7 Channel People Making Waves This Week at AWS, 8x8, Intel, Ingram Micro, More
Sustainability is becoming a greater priority for channel leaders. Read what AWS' CEO had to say about it.
December 2, 2022
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Dell Technologies’ financial results were slightly better than expected during its most recent fiscal quarter. But the company continues to forecast weakness. Revenues were near the high-end of the $23.8 billion-$25 billion range Dell had forecast in August. Nevertheless, the company had lowered its revenue forecast by 8% at the time.
What is Dell doing right? COO Chuck Whitten made waves with his assessment.
“We reduced server backlog consistent with our Q2 commentary and delivered strong profitability as our model allowed us to access component cost deflation faster than the rest of the industry,” said Whitten. “And we stayed focused on relative performance in the most profitable segments of the market.”
Noting the industry-wide falloff in PC demand, Whitten claimed that Dell had gained market share.
“Despite some expected distortions in the PC market given elevated competitor backlog, we continued to gain commercial PC unit share in Q3 and have now gained share in 35 of the last 39 quarters,” Whitten said.
Read more from Jeffrey Schwartz’s reporting here.
Randhir Thakur, the president of Intel’s new contract manufacturing business, made waves for his plans to step down next quarter.
Thakur’s departure from Intel Foundry Services (IFS) doesn’t means the vacuum won’t be filled quickly. Analysts believe Tower Semiconductor CEO Russell Ellwanger is the likely replacement.
Intel earlier this year agreed to acquire Israel-based Tower Semiconductor for $5.4 billion. The acquisition promises to boost the launch of IFS, a significant effort to expand Intel’s manufacturing capacity. But it is also a major effort to generate revenues by providing manufacturing capabilities for other semiconductor companies, including AWS, MediaTek, Nvidia and Qualcomm.
Learn more from our reporting here.
In a Channel Futures guest column, Sanjib Sahoo, executive vice president and chief digital officer of Ingram Micro, makes waves for his views on digital transformation.
Digital transformation, he says, is “about introducing a spirit of change within your team that embraces the art of possible. Whether big or small, today’s organizations must become digitally fit to stay relevant and thrive now and in the future. They must think differently about how to balance experience and automation, talent, and technology.”
Sahoo outlines six digital fitness tips here so that companies can create and capture sustainable business value.
The VMware Americas Partner Organization has a new leader. The multicloud provider recently named Tara Fine as vice president of the division, succeeding Bill Swales, who moved to Lenovo.
Fine makes waves for her tenure in the channel. Before taking on the new VMware Americas partner role, Fine served for six years as senior director for channels for VMware Canada. Prior to that, she spent more than 19 years at Dell Technologies, where she rounded out her career there as director of global commercial channels for North America.
Her goals for the new role include, she says, “accelerating our multicloud vision through the partner ecosystem. I don’t think we can execute that vision without it. So, how do we prepare our partners? How do we help enable them? How do we make it profitable? How do we make it simple?”
Read more from Kelly Teal’s interview with Fine here.
Unified communications provider 8×8 announced that Dave Sipes is no longer its chief executive. Samuel C. Wilson, who most recently held the position of chief financial officer, is succeeding Sipes as interim CEO.
In a blog announcing his first day on the job, Wilson made waves when he took a more positive tone about the company’s financial circumstances.
“I say without hesitation that this is an incredibly innovative, agile and financially strong organization,” he said. “And it will be a privilege to lead 8×8, whose people and mission have inspired me over the past five years.”
8×8 has struggled financially, particularly since June 2021. MarketWatch reports that the company’s stock has plunged about 85% during Sipes’ term.
Find out more about the executive transition here.
RingCentral has approached 8×8 about a possible takeover. This is according to an unnamed Investing.com source who says that RingCentral is working with an investment bank to evaluate a potential transaction.
Blair Pleasant, president and principal analyst of COMMfusion, made waves for her remarks on how such a deal would impact channel partners.
“If the deal goes through – and that’s a big if – there would of course be the usual integration and migration issues facing both companies. It would be challenging for channel partners initially, as these things always are,” Pleasant said. “I would expect to see a pretty clear road map emerge fairly quickly, combining RingCentral message, video and phone with 8×8’s CCaaS and CPaaS offerings.”
Learn how 8×8’s stock price has performed over the last year here.
Calling sustainability “the issue of our generation,” Amazon Web Services CEO Adam Selipsky took the stage this week to deliver an AWS re:Invent keynote speech.
The topics of water, and energy production and consumption, took up a significant portion of Selipsky’s focus. His comments came as the cloud computing sector has raised eyebrows for the excessive use of natural resources required to deliver services.
Selipsky made waves when he announced AWS’ commitment to 100% renewable energy by 2025. He said AWS has already made it 85% of the way there, due in part to the company’s new water-use approach that consumes one-quarter of a liter of water per kilowatt hour. AWS will “return more water to our communities than we use,” Selipsky said. Those efforts will help AWS tackle climate change — “a problem for all of us,” Selipsky said.
Read more highlights from Kelly Teal’s keynote reporting here.
Calling sustainability “the issue of our generation,” Amazon Web Services CEO Adam Selipsky took the stage this week to deliver an AWS re:Invent keynote speech.
The topics of water, and energy production and consumption, took up a significant portion of Selipsky’s focus. His comments came as the cloud computing sector has raised eyebrows for the excessive use of natural resources required to deliver services.
Selipsky made waves when he announced AWS’ commitment to 100% renewable energy by 2025. He said AWS has already made it 85% of the way there, due in part to the company’s new water-use approach that consumes one-quarter of a liter of water per kilowatt hour. AWS will “return more water to our communities than we use,” Selipsky said. Those efforts will help AWS tackle climate change — “a problem for all of us,” Selipsky said.
Read more highlights from Kelly Teal’s keynote reporting here.
Channel people at AWS, 8×8, Intel, Ingram Micro and more are among the individuals making waves this week. Channel Futures’ Channel People Making Waves showcases those who have made an impact over the last seven days. (See our slideshow above.) It’s also a recap of the most-read stories on our website.
The president of Intel’s new contract manufacturing business made waves for his plans to step down next quarter. There’s already speculation of who will be his replacement. Does it have anything to do with Intel’s $5.4 billion acquisition of Tower Semiconductor? Read more from Jeffrey Schwartz’s reporting as featured on our list.
8×8 has terminated its CEO and promoted the CFO to the top spot. 8×8 has had some financial hurdles this past year. Read what the new CEO has to say about the company’s financial footing. His comments appeared in our No. 3 ranked story of the week.
Lastly, what did AWS’ CEO Adam Selipsky think is the most pressing issue of our times? Hint: It’s not specifically tech-related. His comments at AWS re:Invent comprised our most-read story of the week.
From Ingram Micro to AWS to 8×8, that’s a wrap. And, if you didn’t catch our previous edition, you can find it here.
Want to contact the author directly about this story? Have ideas for a follow-up article? Email Claudia Adrien or connect with her on LinkedIn. |
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