IBM Ace Partner Mark Wyllie Moves from Flagship to Masters Telecom

Mark Wyllie, a highly decorated member of the IBM partner community, is leaving the channel partner organization he founded and moving to Masters Telecom.

The former CEO of Flagship Solutions Group has accepted the position of president of embedded solutions and alliances at Masters. For Wyllie, the job change establishes him at one of the channel’s leading solution providers for wireless and telecom. The Verizon-exclusive reseller’s latest appointment lands a channel heavyweight who brings deep experience in cloud solutions and managed services. And all indications are that he will put that expertise to good use building a new unit at the company.

Masters Telecom’s Mark Wyllie

“Mark brings to Masters Telecom an enterprise and broader technology experience such as IBM and Red Hat,” Masters Telecom CEO Douglas Kerl told Channel Futures. “He will be leading a new division to build out embedded IoT solutions, private CBRS/5G networks and cloud services.”

Wyllie announced the change on LinkedIn. He pointed to the opportunity to add cellular components to customer solutions.

“Seriously, as you look at the growth in IoT and the additional application functionality you get from a 5G private network, it’s a huge growth area,” he wrote.

Rise of 5G

Wyllie in an interview with Channel Futures pointed to the growing maturity of 5G – including private 5G networks. The industry evolved to the point where Wi-Fi became a table stakes for businesses. For Wyllie, 5G and private 5G/LTE networks are moving in that direction. As a result, a mobility-focused partner like Masters Telecom made an attractive destination.

“I really think that a lot of technology is going to continue to move to the edge. And a lot of that edge isn’t necessarily going to have telecommunications infrastructure right there. Cellular technology is going to be the best alternative,” he said.

Masters Telecom’s Douglas Kerl

Strong IBM Expertise

Wyllie for 14 years headed up Flagship, Delray Beach, Florida-based provider of technology design, implementation, integration and management. The company carries gold business partner status with IBM and has earned various hardware with the supplier. IBM in 2021 recognized Wyllie with its IBM Champion award. IBM also recognized Flagship as a 2018 and 2019 Beacon Award winner for an outstanding storage systems solution.

The vendor also described Flagship as “an early mover in the cloud.” Flagship’s other strategic partners included Red Hat, HCL Software, VMware and Microsoft.

Wyllie told Channel Futures that he’s looking for ways to bring his previous strategic partnerships into his new company.

“We’ve already reached out to IBM and Red Hat and to AWS to try to understand what partners they already have that could be a good fit,” he said.

Masters Telecom holds status as an elite partner in Verizon’s Mobility Co-sell program, making Verizon its exclusive wireless provider. However, Masters also partners with Cradlepoint, Peplink and other vendors. Its solutions include the Verizon One Talk business phone system, POTS replacement, LTE offerings and IoT solutions.

Masters Telecom launched in 2008, just a handful of months before Flagship did the same.

A Fond Farewell

Wyllie resigned from Flagship about two months ago.

In a LinkedIn post, he acknowledged key individuals he worked with in his tenure at Flagship. Wyllie co-founded the company alongside Douglas Paton and Ed Janeczek. Flagship later added IBM alums Edgard Lopez as senior vice president of sales and strategy and Tom Mitchell as vice president of sales and marketing.

“That team led us through the shift from primarily being a reseller to becoming a world-class provider of integrated leading-edge IBM solutions Flagship is known for,” said Wylie, noting that some clients over the years have included the Atlanta Falcons, NASCAR Professional Fighters League, the Miami Marlins, the Miami Dolphins and many Fortune 500 and enterprise clients. “Those relationships not only generated great projects but we all managed to have some fun along the way,” Wyllie wrote.

Mitchell also recently that he was also resigning from Flagship.

“It has been an awesome adventure building the dedicated and passionate team of individuals that make up the great company that Flagship is today,” he said.

Flagship co-founder and chief operations officer Douglas Paton moved to Masters Telecom in February 2022 and now serves as executive vice president.