CHANNEL CHAMPIONS’ CONFERENCE, 2002: Services For Survival, Services For Health

Recently, DQ Channels India brought partners and vendors together on a common

platform. The occasion was the Channel Champions’ Conference, 2002, and on the

agenda a quickfire discussion on the various aspects of services... The result:

A Rs 22,000-crore opportunit

It was once again that time of the year when DQ Channels India got together

with the channel community to recognize the effort of vendors. The occasion was

the celebration of the DQCI Channels’ Choice Awards held on 5th April in New

Delhi.

But this year the celebrations had a twist to them. DQCI in association with

Epson, hosted the Channel Champions Conference 2002 which consisted of a panel

discussion. Pradeep Gupta, MD, Cyber Media (India) and publisher of DQCI,

welcomed the guests for the evening and presented a realistic perspective of the

financial year 2001-02. He said that, "The year gone by has seen shrinking

margins, shrinking business and shrinking credit terms. It is to the credit of

the channel community that it has shown tremendous resilience and sustained

itself in such tough times."

He was however hopeful for 2002-03 when he said, "The slowdown is past

us. The economy is gathering momentum and we are on our way up."

Services: The new wave of opportunity



Services contributed Rs 22,000 crore worth of business during 2001-02. Quite

naturally the topic for the discussion at the event was ‘Services for survival

and health.’ Services has become important today as the consumer is ready to

pay for a service that is rightly priced.

Raj Kumar Rishi,  country manager (commercial business), HP India “Vendors should see that the right infrastructure in up and running to supply spares”

Representing the channel community were Anil Sachdeva of Kadam Marketing and

President of Delhi Computer Traders Association, Rajesh Bakshi of NetLink

Business Systems and Ranjan Chopra of Team Computers. The vendor’s side was

represented by Amar Babu from Intel, Moninder Jain from Samsung and Raj Kumar

Rishi from HP. Shyam Malhotra, Editor-in-Chief of Cyber Media, moderated the

discussion.

Beginning the discussion, Anil acknowledged the fact that there is money in

services. He added, "Certain standards have been set in the IT industry

with respect to service delivery." The channel today has come to recognize

the fact that an alignment with the authorized service network is essential.

"This is the first step in moving up the value chain and after that the sky

is the limit," he added.

Moninder Jain marketing manager, Samsung India “Ensure that you have in place a model that takes care of service at every key level”

Taking the discussion further, Raj of HP said the first step is to clearly

define what services mean and then fit it into one’s business model. Talking

about the evolution of the market, he said, "A decade ago, market forces

were different from what they are today." He explained that in those times

the entire value chain, starting from vendors to final-tier resellers, were

doing everything.

But over the last ten years, roles have become clearly defined. Vendors are

focussed on demand generation, and wholesalers on credit control while the

customer contact is largely the prerogative of the final-tier reseller. As far

as the product market is concerned a business model has evolved and is in place

today.

Amar Babu GM (channels), Intel India “As a priority, the partner has to be clear on what service spaces he needs to be in”Â

The need of the hour is to define a business model for the services space

too. Each tier in the chain has to fulfill a clearly defined role. Rishi added,

"Vendors’ main responsibility is to see that the right infrastructure is

in place. At the same time, resellers need to ensure that the people in the

field are rightly trained and well-equipped to address the issues at hand."

He added, "Everyone should spend their time and effort on their

responsibility in the entire service value proposition. They should not be doing

what may be someone else’s responsibility."

Time to take charge



Rajesh of NetLink Business Systems addressed a different perspective.

Accordng to him, "It is time to tell the customer that services do not come

for free anymore."

Ranjan Chopra managing director,  Team Computers “Services means buying skills, experience and time...and entails selling these too”

Going back to the times when margins were in double digits, resellers provide

free services. He emphasized that it is time to de-bundle services. He added,

"We have to tell the customer that value-added services cannot come for

free."

Ranjan of Team Computers went on to define services rather interestingly. He

said, "Services are essentially buying skills, experience and time and it

also entails selling the same. What we need to appreciate is what skills are we

buying and what are we selling?" He advised fellow businessmen to look at

what opportunities are vacant and develop skills to address them.

"Opportunities could also lie in geographies that are not being addressed

or it could be a customer segment that is under-addressed," he noted.

The larger picture



There was a great deal of emphasis on the fact that services can never be a

short-term exercise. One has to look at the bigger picture. This was also

relevant as the people involved are an important element to the service

industry. Ranjan said, "You have to ensure that the people are motivated

and you have to show them a career path."

Anil Sachdeva, president, Delhi Computer Traders’ Association “With authorized channels in place, prices for services are set by the vendors themselves”

Taking a cue from Ranjan, Amar of Intel commented that, "The partner as

a priority has to first decide what services one should be in. There are a host

of service offerings that one can get into." An important aspect of the

entire exercise is to analyze all the available opportunities and innovate in

the right way. One should then identify clearly the competence area that he must

work towards.

He added, "It could be a broad area like networking for instance or a

narrower domain like wireless networking." Once a focus area has been

established, the next step is to invest in the right skill sets.

Rajesh Bakshi director, NetLink Business Systems “It is time to tell customers that the days of free services are over and done with”

Whatever the business, white-boxes or services, organizations have to

increasingly adopt a customer-first approach.

The panel came to the conclusion that partners first need to

identify the domain that their organization will address. Then they need to

clearly define a model that will outline the service offerings and help them get

close to the customer. And with that taken care of, the partner organization

will have a lower cost structure to address the issue. This will create a

win-win situation for vendors and partners alike.

MOHIT CHHABRA in New

Delhi