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Rebrand creates a united force in distribution arena
SPECIAL REPORT
THE absorption of Newcastle- based mobile distribution busi- ness Fone Logistics into Ipswich located Anglia Telecom within Daisy Group’s overall channel consolidation plan could have caused a meltdown of customer bases and a north versus south clash of cultures, but accord- ing to the management team at rebranded Daisy Distribution, the best of two businesses adds up to a better result for channel partners and their customers. “The rebrand gave us the opportunity to create an iden- tity. Rather than the organisa- tion being just an amalgamation of Anglia Telecom and Fone Logistics and putting a new name above the door, it gave us the chance to look at our busi- ness, where we want to take it and who we want to work with,” said Julien Parven, former Sales & Marketing Director at Fone Logistics and now Marketing Director at Daisy Distribution. The integration of the two operations commenced in June last year and was completed on October 1st. MD Dave McGinn admits that the operation was ‘challenging’ but dealer and net- work churn was minimal.
Julien Parven
He said: “We’re not saying the whole of the integration went perfectly. There were issues. It was about letting partners know how we were addressing these issues to make sure that we kept them on board.
“As it turned out we only lost 10 customers who left for a variety of reasons and we have 500-plus partners now, the same as when we amalgamated.” Inevitably, the new business has shed some fat. Two finance departments were merged into one and surplus offices and stores were closed, but the directors ensured that robust areas such as Fone Logistics’ IT processes replaced weak ones in Anglia and vice versa. Now, according to Parven, partners have a much richer experience working with Daisy.
“The workflow manage- ment system that came into Daisy Distribution from Fone Logistics will facilitate growth in our partner base,” he said. “It gives partners the oppor- tunity to see a job in process and reduces the burn on part- ner service teams. We used to receive 300 service calls a day, but it’s dropped to 120 because we’ve given partners the ability to interact dynamically with us. “This has also meant we have reduced the time from complet- ing a job to going to self bill which triggers the commission payment. It was at 19.6 days and we have reduced that to 6.2. That’s a 300% improvement in being able to deliver a cash flow benefit to the partner.”
Daisy has ongoing network agreements with the big three mobile operators Vodafone, O2 and Everything Everywhere which brings a strong sales mes- sage to reseller partners operat- ing in the SME space. Equally, as customer demand for converged solutions multi- plies, the duo are confident that the increase in buying power under the Daisy brand will filter down to partners and allow tra- ditional voice and data resellers to address convergence oppor-
tunities, especially in the smart- phone arena, thereby adding value to their businesses. “The smartphone device has
to be the de facto standard now. Within the Apple space we have accreditations in place with each of our network partners and in the Blackberry arena we have got strong links with RIM and have operated with the network agnostic team in the UK for a couple of years,” said Parven. “In fact, within the O2 direct space we account for 10% of O2’s Blackberry connections and we intend to move that towards the 20% mark.” Both Parven and McGinn see partner engagement and building multiple touch points as crucial to a circle of success within the channel. With the integration and rebrand com- plete they now hope to con- vince resellers from all walks of the channel that they have the industry clout, product set and understanding of reseller mind- sets to give Daisy’s shareholders a good return on investment. “We have checks and mea- sures but they do not put too many demands on us. We have been doing this long enough to know what we are doing,” added McGinn.
4 COMMS DEALER MARCH 2011
www.comms-dealer.com
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