Reseller Middle East celebrated the seventh edition of its annual Partner Excellence Awards, at Jumeirah Emirates Towers, Dubai.
The event recognised and celebrated the achievements of IT channel players in the region who have stood out and excelled in their respective fields over the last year. It featured a red carpet and VIP reception for IT channel luminaries, all in true Oscars-style.
CPI Media Group Technology and Finance Division Publishing Director Rajashree Rammohan kicked off the evening’s festivities with a warm welcome note. “We are proud to bestow our highest recognition to the channel players in the IT industry, who despite a challenging market, has enhanced their businesses and excelled over the last year.”
The event also featured a welcome keynote by Basil Ayass, Marketing Director, Dell, where he commended the achievements of the channel industry over the years and the commitment that the channel players have demonstrated despite recent market challenges. “Progress cannot be achieved without change. Having the right business mindset, hard work and staying positive even during the toughest times in the market will help organisations achieve progress and excellence.”
The 2016 edition of the awards programme received an overwhelming number of 300 nominations spanning across 21 categories for vendors, distributors and reseller categories. The evening also saw a number of special awards given away including Readers’ Choice for Vendor and Distributor, which was decided by Reseller ME readers via online voting and was won by Avaya Middle East and Logicom Distributions accordingly.
Reseller ME’s editorial team also recognised individuals and organisations for seven of the Editor’s Choice category accolades, winners include Havier Haddad, EMC Middle East – Partner Champion of the Year; Sherifa Hady, HP – Woman Executive of the Year; Steve Lockie, Westcon Group – Outstanding Executive of the Year- IT channel; Haider Salloum, Microsoft Gulf – Outstanding Executive of the Year- Vendor; StarLink ME – Best Growth Initiative by a Distributor; and Editor’s Choice of the Year – Credence Security.
The most prestigious category of the evening, Best Partner Excellence Programme, both from a distributor and a vendor was awarded to Huawei Middle East and Redington Gulf Value Distribution respectively.
The full length of winners were as follows:
| Networking Vendor of the Year | Cisco |
| Software Vendor of the Year | SAP |
| Mobility Vendor of the Year | Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company |
| Security Vendor of the Year of the Year | Dell Security |
| Peripherals and Accessories Vendor of the Year | Xerox Corporation |
| Systems & Hardware Vendor of the Year | Dell |
| SMB Consumer Vendor of the Year | Microsoft Gulf |
| Best Growth Initiative by a Vendor | TP-LINK |
| Reseller / SI / Retailer categories | |
| Super Retailer of the Year | axiom telecom |
| Systems Integrator of the Year | Gulf Business Machines (GBM) |
| Enterprise Reseller of the Year | Alpha Data |
| SMB & Consumer Reseller of the Year | Quality Computers |
| Distributor categories | |
| Volume Distributor of the Year | Redington Gulf |
| Networking Distributor of the Year | Westcon-Comstor |
| Mobility Distributor of the Year | Oxygen ME |
| Security Distributor of the Year | Aptec – an Ingram Micro company |
| Specialised Distributor of the Year | Exclusive Nettworks |
| Value-added Distributor of the Year | Mindware |
| KSA Distributor of the Year | AlJammaz Distribution |
| Emerging Distributor of the Year | Go Green |
| Best Growth Initiative by a Distributor | StarLink |
| Readers’ Choice Vendor of the Year | Avaya |
| Readers’ Choice Distributor of the Year | Logicom |
| Editor’s Choice | |
| Partner Champion of the year | Havier Haddad, EMC |
| Woman Executive of the Year | Sherifa Hady, HP |
| Outstanding Executive of the Year- IT channel | Steve Lockie, Westcon Group |
| Outstanding Executive of the Year- Vendor | Haider Salloum, Microsoft Gulf |
| Editor’s Choice of the Year | Credence Security |
| Best Partner Excellence Programme of the Year | Redington Gulf Value Distribution |
| Best Partner Excellence Programme of the Year | Huawei Middle East |
