Murray Wright named CDN Top Newsmaker for 2005

In 2005, Murray Wright, through no fault of his own, tells two very important stories in the channel. He is CDN’s top newsmaker because he was unceremoniously dismissed, along with the vice-president of marketing Dave Walsh, at Ingram Micro Canada, which sent shock waves throughout the entire IT industry.

Wright then basically picked himself up, dusted himself off, and managed to land the presidency at Lenovo Canada. For Wright, he admitted that not even in his “wildest dreams” back in January would he believe he’d be the new president of Lenovo Canada replacing Heather Ross, who left to pursue an executive opportunity at TD Canada Trust.

In his role as president of Ingram Micro Canada, Wright thought of Lenovo as an unknown in the market place.

“IBM was going to do something because the PC division was under pressure and we’d often heard that IBM either didn’t make any money or made limited amounts of money in PCD. It made sense to partner with someone who is focused on that business,” he said.

Ingram shocker

On May 20, Wright’s career was given the proverbial curve ball. After a string of profitable years under his tenure, Ingram Micro’s vice-president of North American operations Keith Bradley made managerial changes replacing Wright with Martin Kalsbeek.

To this day, Wright still does not know what happened or why it happened.

“I’d rather focus on Lenevo candidly at this stage. I would tell you that decisions get made in business for a variety of reasons. I am proud of the job I did at Ingram Micro and I left them with big results. I’m looking forward to the challenge of Lenovo and Ingram Micro will be an important partner for us. Everything else is history,” he said.

For more on the CDN’s Top 25 Newsmakers pick up a copy of the December 9, 2005 issue or visit online at www.itbusiness.ca/it/client/en/CDN/Home.asp.

This year’s list includes:

Murray Wright, Lenovo Canada president

Wendy Hayes, Apple Canada director

Mike Lazaridis, RIM president

Stephane Boisvert, former Sun Canada president

Susan Harper, Microsoft Canada’s License compliance manager

Jennifer Stoddart, Canada’s privacy commissioner

Kevin Murai, Ingram Micro president and COO

Robert Courteau, Bell Business Solutions CEO

Michael Murphy, Symantec Canada GM

Doug Wright, Alberta Recycling Management Authority CEO

James Gosling, creator of Java

Alan Schwietzer and Ken Killin of RAM Group

Mark Zafrovski, Nortel Networks CEO

Stephan Elop, Macromedia Inc. CEO

Terry Matthews, Mitel Networks Chairman

Rick Reid, Tech Data Canada president

Bruno Pupo, NEC regional manager

Dave Frederickson, HP Canada’s VP solution partners

Jim Estill, Synnex Canada CEO

Terry Walsh, Cisco Canada president

Stuart Turk, On The Go Technologies CEO

Ian McFarlane, Canon Canada VP and GM

Shawn Snobelen, LG Electronics Canada national sales manager

Edsel Shreve, Siebel Canada regional manager.

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Jim Love, Chief Content Officer, IT World Canada

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Paolo Del Nibletto
Paolo Del Nibletto
Former editor of Computer Dealer News, covering Canada's IT channel community.

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