TD Synnex Names Well-Known Lenovo Alum SVP of Customer Communities

TD Synnex has named Sammy Kinlaw to lead its customer communities as senior vice president of sales communities in North America.

TD Synnex’s Sammy Kinlaw

In his new role, Kinlaw will oversee Varnex, which serves the distribution giant’s SMB community. He’ll also be responsible for Tech Select, for its Advanced Solutions community, and Stellr, which covers MSPs.

Bob Stegner is senior vice president of marketing for North America for TD Synnex. Stegner said Kinlaw has a deep understanding of the channel. Furtherrmore, his extensive knowledge across technologies and vendors makes him uniquely qualified to lead TD Synnex’s member communities.

“It’s critical that each of these distinct communities continues serving its members,” Stegner said. “In overseeing the work of all three organizations, Sammy can manage benefits with equity while allowing for unique offers where needed.”

Creating Legacy

Kinlaw said each of the communities historically has played a significant role for the two distributors pre-merge. He expects their growth to continue.

“That legacy is important to sponsoring vendors and partner members,” said Kinlaw.

Kinlaw’s goal is to drive excellence in events, communications, content and benefits for members, the company says. In addition, he seeks to modernize benefits, deepen and broaden support and improve peer-to-peer exchange.

“Since the merger of Synnex and Tech Data in September, we’ve listened to our members and used historical data as a benchmark to examine every facet of our communities,” said Kinlaw, who, before the merge, was senior vice president of endpoint solutions for the Americas at Tech Data.

“We developed a deep understanding of where our communities sell, what verticals grow and the technologies on which they are focused,” he added. “More importantly, we gained a stronger understanding on how we can shape and deepen our benefits, certifications and training for our members as well as expose them to new technologies to grow their businesses.”