TEMPE, Ariz.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Avnet Technology Solutions, the global IT solutions distribution leader and an operating group of Avnet, Inc. (NYSE: AVT), today announced that four of its U.S.-based executives were named among the 2014 CRN Women of the Channel. The Avnet Technology Solutions executives honored on this list are Alison Challman, vice president, marketing and brand solutions, HP Solutions group; Nicole Enright, vice president, marketing and strategy acceleration; Rebecca Handley, national sales director; and Jessica Yeck, vice president, sales, HP Solutions group. The annual list highlights the accomplishments of female executives within vendor, distribution and solution provider organizations, and the impact they are having on the advancement of the IT channel industry as a whole.
In addition, Enright was selected for the fourth consecutive year as a Power 100 Woman of the Channel. An elite subset of the Women of the Channel list, the Power 100 designation is awarded to the highest-ranking women who exemplify the most sought-after leadership traits in their respective positions. These women have made a name for themselves as leaders within their own companies and the IT channel as a whole.
“Alison, Nicole, Rebecca and Jessica epitomize our commitment to collaborating closely with our partners and suppliers to grow their businesses profitably,” said Jeff Bawol, president, Avnet Technology Solutions, Americas. “All four of these professionals helped our channel community capitalize on high-growth opportunities and navigate the rapidly evolving technology market. We are proud of their well-deserved industry recognition from CRN, and it highlights the positive impact these executives have had in positioning Avnet, our partners and our suppliers for long-term success.”
Named to the Women of the Channel list for the second time, Challman was selected for her part in defining the marketing strategies for Avnet’s HP Solutions team over the past year. Specifically, she was instrumental in creating go-to-market strategies, enablement programs and channel-ready solutions to help HP partners capitalize on high-growth market opportunities, such as big data and analytics, converged solutions and cloud computing. She also launched Avnet Practice+ for Analytics to accelerate channel success in selling big data and analytics solutions, resulting in substantial growth in HP software sales plus incremental hardware and services opportunities. Challman enabled the channel community to earn thousands of HP certifications and played a significant role in Avnet becoming the first distributor to sell HP’s Moonshot System, the world’s first software-defined web server.
Over the past year, Enright played a significant role in aligning Avnet’s sales and marketing efforts with top technology trends in order to accelerate the success of Avnet’s channel partners. Her primary focus was on developing resources and capabilities that enabled Avnet’s partners to offer more complete solutions to their end-user customers around converged infrastructure, cloud computing, mobility, and big data and analytics. Leveraging Avnet’s services capabilities in conjunction with these important market drivers allowed Avnet’s channel partners to not only provide innovative hardware to meet the technology needs of their customers, but also the software and services that empowered partners to solve their customers’ business problems.
Making her first appearance on the Women of the Channel list, Handley spearheaded the successful onboarding of three new Avnet product lines in the past year for her sales territory: EMC, HP and CommVault. She was instrumental in managing the necessary change brought about through these expansions and focused on increasing employees’ knowledge of the new solution areas so they could provide Avnet’s partners with the highest quality of service. Her efforts were vital in Avnet’s continued acceleration in the growth of cloud, software and services offerings.
Making her second consecutive appearance on the Women of the Channel list, Yeck helped Avnet’s partners and suppliers grow in innovative ways. Throughout the past year, Yeck enhanced the expertise of her sales team in data center solutions, converged systems, and big data and analytics to help them support partners at an even deeper level. In doing so, she continued to champion programs for HP that differentiate its technology and drive its market share.
“These female executives have risen in the ranks of their organizations and are leaving their indelible mark on the technology channel. We celebrate their many contributions and the varied ways in which they help solution providers grow and thrive every day,” said Robert Faletra, CEO, The Channel Company. “We congratulate the Women of the Channel, and look forward to their continued success.”
The Women of the Channel will be featured in the June issue of CRN magazine and online at www.crn.com.
Click to tweet: Avnet's Alison Challman, Nicole Enright, Rebecca Handley and Jessica Yeck named 2014 @CRN Women of the Channel http://www.crn.com/.
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About The Channel Company
The Channel Company is the channel community's trusted authority for growth and innovation, with established brands including CRN, XChange Events, IPED, and SharedVue. For more than three decades, we have leveraged our proven and leading-edge platforms to deliver prescriptive sales and marketing solutions for the technology channel. The Channel Company provides Communication, Recruitment, Engagement, Enablement, Demand Generation and Intelligence services to drive technology partnerships. Learn more at www.thechannelcompany.com.
About Avnet Technology Solutions
As a global IT solutions distributor, Avnet Technology Solutions collaborates with its customers and suppliers to create and deliver services, software and hardware solutions that address the business needs of their end-user customers locally and around the world. The group serves customers and suppliers in North America, Latin America and Caribbean, Asia Pacific, and Europe, Middle East and Africa. It generated US $10.36 billion in annual revenue for fiscal year 2013. Avnet Technology Solutions is an operating group of Avnet, Inc. For more information, visit http://www.ats.avnet.com.
About Avnet
Avnet, Inc. (NYSE: AVT), a Fortune 500 company, is one of the largest distributors of electronic components, computer products and embedded technology serving customers globally. Avnet accelerates its partners' success by connecting the world's leading technology suppliers with a broad base of customers by providing cost-effective, value-added services and solutions. For the fiscal year ended June 29, 2013, Avnet generated revenue of $25.5 billion. For more information, visit www.avnet.com.
