Novell Reorganizes Channel Chief Role

Novell promotes channel chief Javier Colado out of the job, four months after Colado took it on with the directive to make Novell more channel-centric. And his replacement? Novell's chief marketing officer will take on the channel chief job, too.

Novell's channel chief role is looking less stable than ever these days.

Four months after he took the channel leadership position at embattled Novell, Javier Colado has been promoted to president of Novell's EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) organization.

Javier Colado was named in September 2008 to lead the channel organization, effectively replacing Pat Bernard, who left Novell eight months after she joined. The previous channel chief, Steve Erdman, lasted a more reasonable year and nine months on the job, from February 2006 through November 2007.

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The directive for Bernard and Colado was to make Novell a more channel-centric company. In an interview with Channel Insider in September, Colado said he would not change any of Bernard's initiatives, which included a deal registration effort, but rather would simply accelerate the transition to being more centered on the channel.

With Colado's promotion, however, Novell's partner and channel organization is slated to transition to reporting to Novell Chief Marketing Officer John Dragoon. Dragoon reportedly will serve as both CMO and channel chief, with other channel managers reporting to him.

In his new role as president of Novell EMEA, Colado will report to Novell President and CEO Ron Hovsepian.

"Javier's leadership in launching Novell's new channel strategy, as well as his strong sales management experience, will serve him well in his new role and enhance the execution of our new partner-centric model in EMEA," Hovsepian said in a statement announcing the promotion. "Likewise, the work Javier and John have done together on our new partner and marketing programs will assure their seamless and integrated execution, upon the transition of the partner responsibilities to John."

Colado began his tenure at Novell in 2006 as area general manager and vice president for western EMEA, where he was responsible for all operations, sales and marketing.

Dragoon joined Novell in 2003 as vice president of marketing for the Americas and was appointed senior vice president and CMO in 2006. He is responsible for all aspects of Novell's marketing strategy and activities worldwide. Prior to Novell, Dragoon held senior executive positions at Art Technology Group, Internet Capital Group and IBM, Novell said in a statement.

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