Strategy Maverick adds depth to LFDs


Maverick’s claim to the “home of collaboration” has been substan- tially reinforced by the news that the distributor has expanded its large format displays in the UK. New vendor partners Sharp, View- Sonic, Acer, LG Compro and Ii- yama to its Sony and LG to allow Maverick’s integration partners to take full advantage of high-growth applications such as collaboration and digital signage.


Maverick says that the addition of the additional brands is more than a marketing exercise. The distrib- utor is supporting the extended portfolio with a £1.5 million stock investment, a new dedicated LFD team and a selection of pan-Euro- pean services to help UK integra- tors working on international roll outs.


The team, which includes Grant Keenan as Business Manager, Blaine Johnstone as Product Man- ager, Mohammad Oftadeh as Busi- ness Development Manager and Matt Keen as General Manager leading a field sales drive, is Maver- ick’s first dedicated team focussed on large format display, to aid cli- ents with specifying, accessories and technical support.


The relationship with Sharp is potentially the most fruitful for Maverick. The vendor’s takeover by Foxconn opens up a huge cat- alogue of technologies to exploit in future products. Even Sharp’s ex-


isting products have arguably been undersold in the past, with the new partnership with Maverick and an ambitious programme of product launches, including six new prod- ucts at ISE, will help increase the channel’s knowledge of Sharp’s professional display range. As the Maverick portfolio expands there will, of course, be the inevi- table vendor conflicts. Microsoft Surface Hub is one of the jewels in the Maverick crown, and while the solutions are very different, Sharp’s announcement of the new 80-inch BIG PAD with optical bonding and a new set of 40-inch interactive displays for huddle spaces will con- sume spend in the collaborative arena. Jon Sidwick, VP of Maver- ick Europe explains said at ISE: “We are seeing an explosion in the adoption of video in meetings with Skype for Business leading the way in connecting businesses on a global scale. We are working across all our operating regions to create collaboration suites to help vendors and integrators to take advantage of this huge growth market.” Also at ISE, Sid Stanley, Sharp’s General Manager for Visual Solu- tions, said: “The way organisations hold meetings is evolving. Meet- ings can now be more informal, and require versatile technology that is quick to set up, easy to use and that supports personal devices and tablets. Meetings need to be


up and running within 30 seconds, whether people are wirelessly shar- ing content to discuss or using vid- eo collaboration. Our response is to broaden our award-winning BIG PAD range, taking its team-working benefits out of the formal meeting room and into the rest of the of- fice.”


An integrated Mini OPS extension slot lets users add extra functions, for example by inserting an option- al Wireless Board mobile devices such as laptops or tablets can then be wirelessly connected to share content and control functions, without the need for any cables. Mini OPS is a newer and smaller version of the popular OPS (Open Pluggable Specifications) format. ViewSonic also represents an opportunity that is yet to be fully realised. a reinforced UK team and the partnership with Maverick should see them bring new focus on supporting partners in the chan- nel. ViewSonic’s portfolio includes both large format and interactive screens from 32” to 84”, which offer feature rich design and com- petitive price points. Elsewhere in this issue, we report that ViewSon- ic is raising its channel profile, with an expanded marketing campaign, including sponsorship of the AV News Awards 2018. Iiyama’s large format display has been added to


range the Maverick portfolio after the ven-


LG’s hotel and commercial OLED displays to join the Maverick portfolio.


dor achieved huge success with its monitors. The ProLite range includes models from 32” to 86” with picture in picture capability and the ability to switch simply from portrait to landscape orienta- tion, useful for digital signage ap- plications.


Of the specialist niche applica- tions, LG is well prepared to com- pete for the next generation of hotel TVs as well as providing competi- tive solutions for current demands. The vendor has expanded its rela- tionship with Maverick in the UK, to include its Commercial Lite TV and OLED Commercial Display ranges, in addition to its existing Hotel TV range. The displays, de- signed for both in room and digital signage applications, feature per- sonalisation and bespoke custom-


isation via LG’s ProCentric Applica- tion and easy connectivity through its built-in SuperSign system. Finally, one for the future. After a long relationship with ACER, across a huge number of prod- ucts, Maverick will be partnering with the brand on its imminent launch into the large format display market. The complete Maverick portfolio has been shaped to offer resellers and integrators a choice of platforms and price points across a range of market sectors. Maverick’s UK MD Tony Scully explains the overall rationale: "Sharp's acquisition by Foxconn


and the investment that brings the company makes it a really great time to be working with the brand, with new innovations and some great product sets for our resellers.


Misco enhances advisory role in education


Seeing Misco exhibiting Mic- rosoft Surface Hub at BETT, peeked our curiosity. Like many other SME businesses in the UK, we had always regarded the e-tailer as a reliable, good value supplier of IT equipment, but never really enquired much further than that. How wrong we were – it turns out that Misco has been a supplier of AV / IT project solutions for 30 years, and is now actively en- gaged in market development and user education. We were grateful, then, to put the record straight with an in- terview with Misco’s Colin Ro- sam to discuss the company’s role in supporting classroom planning, collaboration, cen- tralised reporting and analysis with the host of new technol- ogies demonstrated at BETT. It turns out that Misco’s expe- rience in education has em- braces supplying IT products and services to the education sector, within primary and sec-


ondary schools; multi-academy trusts and higher education es- tablishments.


Rosam explained that Misco’s involvement with education goes beyond classroom engage- ment and pedagogy to the in- creasingly important planning and management tional


institutions.


of educa- At BETT,


bursars and other senior man- agers were invited to can talk to the Misco team about how to share management reports, analysis


and insights, using


Microsoft Power BI software. Power BI is a suite of analytics tools that allow teams to visual- ise data on any device, review teaching and learning activity and share insights.


The introduction of collabora-


tive teaching models was again one of the leading themes of this year’s BETT, with many ed- ucation buyers seeking help on investments in unfamiliar tech- nologies. Rosam explained that the ‘trusted advisor’ role was fa-


with other teachers online and mark coursework. Teachers attending BETT were able to evaluate Microsoft Surface Hub collaboration de-


with colleagues.


But Misco is not all about Mi- crosoft. In a separate exercise, Misco demonstrated its plat- form independence by inviting


miliar to Misco and its vertical- ly aligned teams of experts. For example, ad continuing with the collaboration theme, Mis- co demonstrated how teachers and students can use Microsoft 365 apps to share lesson plans and assignments, collaborate


vices. Attendees were to invit- ed to find out the best way to use the collaborative devices to facilitate remote learning and easily to use shared content from laptops and tablets to en- hance classroom activities, as well as hosting virtual meetings


Teachers attending BETT were able to evaluate Microsoft Surface Hub collaboration devices.


60 teachers the Cheshire LEA to attend Misco’s ‘Apple in Ed- ucation’ event at Tatton Park. Attendees gained an insight into the new ways in which Ap- ple solutions could be of bene- fit to the pupils they teach and their organisations as a whole. The task for the day was to solve a murder mystery crime scene and those in atten- dance were able to view, first- hand, the ways in which Apple technology, notably iPad with iOS, can act as an enabler for driving student engagement, collaboration and teamwork by constructing and drawing suspect


profiles and sharing


this information on a live feed through apps.


LEA staff used Showbie to collate the profiles for each of the suspects and message board to get everyone’s initial thoughts on characters. Key- note was then used to create the suspect profiles and to gather their background stories


and facts before Padlet gave attendees the chance to ask characters and suspects one question to help make their final decisions. Lastly, Kahoot was used to check their knowl- edge and understanding from the day’s activities.


Overall, more than 40,000 information technology prod- ucts are included in Misco’s portfolio. The company is an approved supplier to the edu- cation sector under the Crown Commercial Service ICT Ser- vices for Education; IT Relat- ed Accessories and Parts; Na- tional Desktop and Notebook Agreement; National Education Printer Agreement and the Crescent Purchasing Consor- tium.


There is clearly much more to Misco that we had imagined and we suspect that the depth of the company’s involvement in education will come as a surprise to many.


The additional of LG Compro com- pletes our portfolio and allows us access to the whole display range, which is testament to the great work our teams have done to date across the whole portfolio, with a huge cus- tomer breadth buying LG now. "Acer is an exclusive agreement and that is testament to the great work we're done with the team across its other products through Maverick and the wider Tech Data group of companies. It's great to be working with ViewSonic’s Tony White again after we did some great things with him in his last position. The expansion of our range is de- signed to give our resellers a more holistic portfolio of options and make us the first place you think of when you need a large format dis- play."


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