01732 759725 24 Q&A With Colin Blumenthal, Vice President, IT Services Europe Technology Reseller (TR): How was 2022 for you and what are you looking forward to in 2023? Colin Blumenthal (CB): Complete I.T. has been in business 30 years – three and a half of those as part of Sharp. So, at Sharp IT Services, as we were renamed in November, there's not much we haven't seen. Looking back over last year, it’s clear that the momentum to cloud services and more processes being done in the cloud, whether that's public or private, is increasing. The pandemic kick-started that with remote working and Microsoft Office 365, and Teams and Zoom specifically, and we saw the migration to public cloud services continue in 2022. Businesses now have confidence in using public cloud, bar a few pockets like national security-type businesses. Our focus is SME businesses, which is why we were a good fit for Sharp. Internally, the integration with Sharp in the UK has continued, with more and more shared services between the teams. IT, marketing, HR and finance are all now shared services and we also share some offices. Sharp has moved into our Bristol office; we're establishing ourselves in Yorkshire, operating out of Sharp’s Wakefield office. We are now also in their Birmingham office, in West Bromwich, from their Midshire acquisition. And we’ve got help desks in Manchester as well. We probably share half of our 7 locations with Sharp. This integration, and the change of name, gives us a launchpad to really accelerate the cross-sell of our brand of IT services to Sharp’s SME direct client base. That's what we're looking to achieve in 2023. TR: Are you planning to extend those services to Sharp’s reseller base as well? CB: The pledge I made at May’s Future Workplace event was that we would arrange roundtables to discuss with print dealers the opportunity of introducing IT services to their clients, and we are still in that phase. We have had some meetings with Sharp dealers. A lot of them are doing something in IT already, but the main feedback we get is concern about losing control of their client. They worry that with this big corporate coming in the client will start to use Sharp for everything rather than the reseller. That opens up the question of whether we could white-label our IT services through Sharp dealers. It is certainly something we will consider, but my own view is that SME businesses really want to know who they're dealing with when it comes to IT and would prefer to have a direct relationship with their IT partner rather than buying through somebody else. That's my opinion and I could be wrong. As I say, we're still in the research phase. That said, selling IT services through Sharp resellers is definitely something we want to do, if we can make it work for everybody. TR: What are the challenges that Sharp IT Services will have if you do decide to add IT services to your reseller offering? CB: If it’s successful and we expand our client base by selling through Sharp dealers, then it is just the standard challenge of taking on more people. Right now it is difficult to find the right technical people who are both people- and servicefocused. Technology Live 2023 returns to the Business Design Centre, London on September 12. The one-day event brings together vendors and resellers/MSPs from across the ICT space to make connections, build relationships and find out about new technologies. Attracting suppliers from the IT, cybersecurity, AV, print and telecoms sectors, Technology Live has a strong focus on diversification and the opportunities that exist for resellers to expand into new product areas. As part of Technology Reseller’s build-up to the event, we will be running a series of articles on Technology Live itself and on the themes of convergence and diversification generally. This month’s interview with Colin Blumenthal, Managing Director of Sharp IT Services, previously known as Complete I.T., falls into the second category. The company has been providing IT support to SMEs for 30 years, the last three and half under the ownership of Sharp, which acquired Complete I.T. in 2019 with the intention of adding IT services, including security and telephony, to its offering for direct customers and eventually to its reseller channel as well. Sharp’s expansion into IT services was a logical move that has enabled it to give customers a complete product and service offering, including managed print, AV, IT services and telephony – a model it is now seeking to replicate across Europe. Today, Colin Blumenthal is not just MD of Sharp IT Services in the UK but also Sharp’s Vice President of IT Services in Europe. In this Q&A he outlines some of the opportunities and challenges that diversification has brought and explains why entering new technology areas requires careful management. Q&A Business Design Centre · London · 12 September 2023 23 ICT · MANAGED IT · MOBILE · PRINT Colin Blumenthal
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