New Beginnings

Last fortnight has been one of tremendous upheavals for me personally. As
some of you might be aware, I joined Cybermedia in 2006 to work for The DQ Week
and have since then been on a learning curve trying to fathom the channel
business in India. I was a complete greenhorn when I joined the industry. I
still remember with much amusement how when someone asked me do I know what IT
channels are I looked completely askance and said' 'I only know TV channels'.
Well that was then but if I am to be honest I have learned a lot in the last
four years.

And in all that learning among the many people who was helpful was Vinita
Bhatia, my ex-colleague and mostly my partner in crime. Not only did she anchor
the channel community for western India, it was her knowledge of solution
providing business, which was impeccable. Plus she was and still is among the
few people on planet who appreciate my sense of humor.

For me and for most of us, for the longest time Vinita was synonymous for all
that DQ Channels stood for. So now stepping into those shoes, is going to be an
uphill task, especially considering that I do not share Vinita's passion for
high heels (I did warn about my zany humor).

So this fortnight starts my journey into the realm of solutions. Being part
of the channels group has ensured that I am not the greenhorn that I was all
those years ago.

And what better way to start than to declare the winners of the Channel
Choice. This is the survey, which DQ Channels and IDC has been doing now for the
seventh year now in a row. Through this yearly exercise we try to feel the pulse
of the channel in terms of their views on the vendors. While there are a lot of
awards that third parties like The DQ Week and even vendors give to channel
partners for excellence in business, DQ Channels Choice Awards hold the
distinction of being one of a kind exhaustive survey, which taps the mood of
channels from across India and rewards vendors.

This time, we divided the categories in two broad sections. For the product
categories, the survey rated vendors on various parameters. To get a balanced
response, 574 channel partners who were polled from were taken from across 19
cities in India, which included both metro cities and even upcountry locations.

The new addition this time are the winners in the solution space. To get a
quantitative result, face-to-face structured interviews were conducted across 11
cities amongst 100 solution providers. So all in all as Jack Reacher, one of my
favorite single unit destructive man machine would say, we have done our work
the 'hard way'. We have crisscrossed the country and while there might not be
many upheavals but I can assure you there will be some surprises there. So enjoy
reading the story, we sure had some fun and lots of work doing it.

Starting this issue we are also trying to bring out some hidden facts about
some of your friends. Turn to last page to read poetry by one of the biggest SPs
in India. If you have similar passion for writing, photography or anything and
would like to share it with us, just write in to me and we would be more than
happy to publish.

Hope that you keep giving DQ Channels the love and support as you have done
always.

Happy reading!

shivangiy@cybermedia.co.in