Veteran distribution executive John Paget will take over world operations of Avnet Inc.’s partner divisions next month with a mandate to increase the group’s growth by broadening its offerings.
Paget, who had been president of Synnex Corp.’s technology solutions division until last week, will become global president of Avnet Technology Solutions(ATS) on March 5, the company said Wednesday.
ATS includes VARs that are members of Avnet Partner Solutions and Access Distribution, which Avnet bought from GE Finance in November.
“I’m very excited about the new role,” he told CDN.
Paget said he was recruited several weeks ago for the job, which has been vacant since last July when ATS head Rick Hamada was promoted to chief operating officer of Avnet Inc.
In making the move Paget jumps from a corporation with about US$6 billion in annual revenue to one with roughly $US14 billion.
The difference is that at Synnex his responsibilities were limited to North America. He said the ATS job was attractive because “because of its worldwide scope, and the fact that it melds the strategic and the tactical approaches.”
Another reason, he said, is to broaden the direction of Avnet Technology Solutions, which has been tilted towards enterprise solutions for Hewlett-Packard, IBM, ESS, and, with the Access purchase, Sun Microsystems.
But Paget believes ATS has to bring more solutions around industry-standard x86 products for small and medium businesses.
“We’re seeing, especially in Canada, rapid adoption of industry-standard servers,” he said. “That is certainly a growth curve, and to be able to lead that would be really important.”
While it’s a volume business, solutions can still be built around those products, he said.
“There’s a fairly dramatic change in the marketplace from what had been a bifurcated distribution model, and Avnet would clearly fall into the enterprise distributor model, and Synnex, which in the main would be a broadline distribution model,” he said.
Synnex’s technology solutions division, “was a solutions distribution model, which was in between.
“It’s my belief, and the majority of the marketplace believes, that will be the wave of distribution in the future. The overall distribution model hasn’t changed dramatically for 10 or 12 years now, and I think as the marketplace changes it’s incumbent on us to change our distribution models to meet that marketplace.”
What will emerge among distributors, he said, is “a very strong focus on integrated solutions that get delivered in a solutions distribution model.”
“It’s not a dramatic change” to add more x86-based solutions, he said. “I would call it adjacent markets for the Avnet world.”
He plans to convince Avnet partners the shift is right by “creating the solution sets and support that make sense in their market . . . and then taking them to market through those resellers with the appropriate demand creation.”
Owner of what he calls a Texas “ranchette” where he raises a small herd of cattle, Paget will move to Phoenix, where Avnet is headquartered. Meanwhile, the man who by his admission rises early and works late, has promised his wife that before he starts his new job they’ll have a three-day vacation.
“That’s not a word she’s knows the definition of, after all these years.” he added.
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