SPECIAL NEWS REPORT Comms giant strides in
Huawei is best known as a large scale carrier business but its reputation is about to change following a big push towards the enterprise marketplace, and the man aiming to make an unprecedented impact in the new target zone, incoming VP for Enterprise Business UK and Ireland, Simon Culmer, already has the end game in his sights.
Simon Culmer E
arlier this year Huawei Enterprise was established as a stand-out business
group with the capacity to build powerful muscle. “Huawei Enterprise is a growing force in the UK and Ireland enterprise market,” said Culmer. “Huawei sees the Enterprise Business as the main force for growth in the future, and Huawei UK aims to double its enterprise sales by 2012 and do the same again by 2013. Longer term I plan to make Huawei a brand that is seen as being of the highest quality and the best value available in the UK and Ireland enterprise market.”
Culmer is responsible for sales and marketing and establishing Huawei’s local distribution channel, building a team of high touch account
managers, channel account managers, industry experts and recruiting tier one channel partners. One of the biggest challenges he faces is successfully overcoming any pre-conceptions of working with a Chinese organisation. As the world’s second largest telecom vendor, Huawei has already succeeded in achieving this in the carrier and mobile space.
“We just need to bring the same change in perception within Enterprise,” added Culmer, who is already setting a clearly defined five year strategy and building the team to scale beyond his mid-term plan. “And exceed expectations with channel partners and customers in everything we do, since we only have one chance to make a first impression.”
A key factor in Culmer’s channel strategy is to avoid overlap. “This is a large market and we are only just joining it,” he explained. “There is room for many complementary partners and I do not want to over-saturate the market and make it too difficult for partners to differentiate themselves. We want to be commercially and technically competitive to our end users and to our partners. For too long, partners have been squeezed between manufacturers and end users and have seen their margins erode to barely sustainable levels. Perhaps it is time for a change.”
Steely determination Culmer aims to match Huawei’s Enterprise Division with the operational performance of its carrier, mobile and terminal divisions by following a policy of steely determination and education. “We need to be bold in what we are setting out to do and learn from the experience of both carrier and mobile which were first into this market. This way we pre-empt potential obstacles before they slow us down,” he explained. “We must believe in ourselves and our ability to succeed, and save our customers money, protect margins for our partners and impress with our technology, as well as be easy to do business with while resourcing generously.”
The move to cloud computing is a significant opportunity for Huawei, which has products in IP networking, storage, security, blade and rack servers, thin clients and its own virtualisation offering. “We are strongly positioned to build our customers a one-stop-shop, end-to-end solution of great scale,” said Culmer. “I also believe that video is going to offer the next wave of growth as it moves to the norm and aligns with telephony. Further, with our expertise and product range reaching back into the very core of networks and forward into servers, storage, appliances, tablets and handsets, all of which we design, manufacture and sell ourselves, we are strongly positioned to offer attractive end-to-end capabilities, features and significant commercial propositions.”
Culmer brings 27 years industry experience to his new role, including 12 years at former Sun Microsystems (now Oracle) and an 11 year stint at Cisco Systems. He describes his new role as a ‘fantastic opportunity’ to put into practice everything he has learned, with a recipe for success that includes hard work, resilience, a thick skin, a positive outlook and a passion to succeed, aligned to having been part of, and a contributor to, significant high growth phases at two
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former employers where he was instrumental in creating hundreds of jobs.
“The market opportunity before us is without parallel and Huawei has some truly innovative offerings, both technically and commercially, that will allow us to become a significant player in the UK enterprise marketplace,” affirmed Culmer.
Next month we introduce incoming Enterprise Channel Director UK&I, David Poskett.
Just a minute with Simon Culmer...
What talent do you wish you had? I wish I could play the guitar properly.
Name three ideal dinner guests. Winston Churchill, what an incredible life and a great raconteur; Michael McIntyre, funny and entertaining; Adele, grounded and soulful.
How would you like to be remembered? Nice bloke who got things done.
Name one thing you couldn’t do without in your job. Great people who work hard and are fun to be around.
What possession could you not live without? My phone.
What do you fear the most? Losing someone close.
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