Changes for the channel

The international ICT market was quiet last week, while the local market was dominated by the Cisco news and the entry of Ingram Micro into SA.

* A satisfactory Q1 for Datacraft Asia, a unit of Dimension Data. Revenue was up only 7%, although profit increased nearly 50%.
* Mediocre Q2 numbers from Net 1 UEPS, with revenue and income slightly down, impacted heavily by currency fluctuations.
* A positive trading update from DigiCore.
* The restructuring of Cisco SA into two black empowered entities, Cisco Capital and Cisco Advanced Services. Each will be 25% black-owned. The current GM of Cisco SA, Clive Fynn, has resigned and will not be part of the new structure.
* The establishment of Ingram Micro SA, as from 1 June, through a joint venture with MB Technologies.
* The launch of Compliant IT, a distribution company.
* The appointments of Simon Duffy as chairman of Cell C and Branislav Zivkovic as MD of Lexmark SA.
* The resignations of Hans Horn as MD of Lexmark SA and Talaat Laham as chairman of Cell C.
* Some job losses at Cell C.

* Satisfactory financial numbers from Mobinil (Egypt).
* The appointments of Peter Dimitriadis as channel director Africa for Open Text, Dietlof Mare as MD of Vodacom Tanzania, Godfrey Mbingo as MD of Vodacom Lesotho, and Mervyn Visagie as MD of Vodacom Congo.

Overseas, Ingram Micro, a $30 billion turnover company, has 170 000 solution providers and relationships with all the major hardware vendors.

Paul Booth, MD, Global Research Partners

* HP acquired Bristol Technology, a provider of technologies that monitor business transactions.
* Hitachi Data Systems bought Archivas, a storage software company.
* The death of Jean Ichbiah, the developer of the Ada programming language.
* Job loss announcements from Alcatel-Lucent, Eastman Kodak, Level 3 Communications and Nortel Networks.
* Planned IPOs from Sitronics, a Russian technology company.
* A good IPO by Mellanox Technologies, a maker of silicon chips for Internet video and other applications.
* An IPO from Cellcom Israel.
* An IPO by Millicom International Cellular's Columbian unit.

* A bid for JVC, an affiliate of Matsushita Electric, by private equity groups.

* The global mobile market is expected to top $150 billion by 2011, says Informa Telecoms & Media.

* JSE All share index: Down 0.05%
* Nasdaq: Down 0.7%
* Top SA share movements: Cape Empowerment Trust (+20.6%), Cyberhost (-12.5%), Digicore (+16.7%), I-Solutions (-20.6%), Synergy (-12.5%), Vestor (+76.9%) and Zaptronix (-12.5%)
* Top international share movements (last two weeks): Aviza Technology (+61.9%), Broadvision (+34.7%), Cicero (-29.4%), Exabyte (+100%), SCM Microsystems (+26.2%), Secure Computing (+27.9%), SunCom Wireless Holdings (+28.9%), Vimicro International (-26.3%), Vitesse Semiconductor (+26.3%) and Volt Information Sciences (-29.3%)

Ingram Micro's entry into the local market and the emergence of Compliant IT could mean a major shake-up for the South African channel. Overseas, Ingram Micro, a $30 billion turnover company, has 170 000 solution providers and relationships with all the major hardware vendors. I await details of the local operation with great interest.