Hewlett-Packard Co. resellers were caught flat-footed when Kevin Gilroy, longtime HP channel leader, was promoted to senior vice president of worldwide SMB segment operation in early July, but in a Tuesday morning press call, Gilroy revealed that HP will be announcing a new channel leader within one to two weeks.

Gilroy is a 23-year HP veteran, and he spent 19 of those years in the channel program. To many resellers, Gilroy was the HP channel.

The senior HP executive replaced John Brennan, who left HP to take on the job of senior vice president of corporate development at Adobe Systems Inc.

During the transition, HP's channel program was put in the hands of Scott Anderson, vice president of partner operations. There has been no word whether Anderson will permanently step into the top channel spot.

HP officials had announced that the firm would look both inside and outside the company for a top channel official. HP's channel has been facing fierce challenges from PC OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) like Dell Inc., larger system vendors like IBM, and printer OEMS such as Lexmark International Inc.

Just because Gilroy is in charge of SMB (small to medium businesses) doesn't mean he's no longer working on channel issues. On Tuesday, he announced that two HP channel financing programs, Indirect Flooring and Channel Capitalization, are being merged into a single offering called Partner Capitalization. This new program will help HP's SMB segment, but it's also a major reorganization of a channel program and Gilroy clearly helped shape it.