These days technology buying decision making has shifted from the IT department to the CFOs who are looking for solutions to business problems instead of a list of speeds and feeds of a new server product.
With that in mind, Ingram Micro has launched the Ingram Micro Experience Center to showcase Cisco solutions to business problems. The new 1,000-square foot center is part of Ingram Micro’s Solution Center in Buffalo, NY and offers not only technical training and hands-on demos, but also enables partners to invite business owners to come in and see how Cisco technology can solve business problems.
The site features a Cisco TelePresence Suite that can connect to Ingram Micro’s TelePresence suite in Santa Ana, Calif. or any other Cisco TelePresence system. Other technology that the Experience Center showcases includes Cisco’s Data Center, Borderless Network and Collaboration solutions.
For partners who are unable to make it to the Buffalo, NY location, particularly in the winter months, Ingram Micro has created a portal to help them benefit from the center as well.
“We’ve made an online portal available for those partners that will include sales enablement through tactical sales videos and an engineering lab that will showcase and allow partners to view demos,” Holly Garcia, senior director of vendor management, told Channel Insider.
Ingram Micro says the Experience Center provides customers with a no risk, try-before-you-buy customer engagement tool, giving channel partners a first-hand look at how Cisco technology actually works. The center includes more than $2 million worth of new equipment, and it will double as a training lab and hands-on education classroom for Cisco channel partners.