Avaya Canada, who has been struggling with leadership issues recently, just got a big shot in the arm with the announcement of Ange Valentini as its new channel chief.
Valentini is a 20 year veteran of Cisco Canada and he replaces Rob Auld who only lasted in the role for about six months. According to a source Auld left Avaya Canada for another opportunity at SOTI Inc., an enterprise mobility management vendor based in Mississauga, Ont.
Valentini, who sometimes goes by Angelo, was the chief financial officer at Cisco Canada and left that position late last year. Valentini was the acting channel chief of Cisco Canada in 2009 in-between the period of office of Ross Pellizzari and Donna Wittmann.
At Avaya Canada Valentini will be responsible for driving partner engagement through channel programs in through established partners.
Gordon Blackie, Avaya’s Vice President of the Americas International region said he was “very happy” that Valentini joined Avaya as he brings a wealth of experience to the role.
While at Cisco Valentini did serve as manager of channels operations sales for the Canadian subsidiary that including working with distributors.
One of his biggest accomplishments was spearheading the creation of Cisco Canada’s contact centre in support of channel partners in the SMB.
Valentini’s appointment comes during a time of flux at Avaya Canada.
The subsidiary is currently without a president. Walter Andri left the organization in February. Jocelyn Larochelle was named acting sales leader for the Canadian operation and is handling Andri’s duties. Avaya is in the process of hiring a new president and managing director for Avaya Canada.
Also in February Avaya announced Santiago Aguirre as its new channel chief for Canada, Latin America and the Caribbean also known as the Americas International region for the Basking Ridge, N.J.-based networking and collaboration vendor.
All this got started last summer with the promotion of Miles Davis, the former channel chief to the position of vice president of sales for Eastern Canada. Davis was still handling the channel role until the Auld announcement.
Davis held the position of channel chief for two years and in that time instituted the Recruit Onboard Accreditation Develop Sustain program, put in place a bold initiative to double Avaya’s mid-market business in the next two years, and brought in more partner incentives than ever before.
