technologyreseller.co.uk 39 comfortable bringing it to the market because people’s understanding of AI is further forward than it was before. TR: What are your plans for the rest of the year? PG: We’ve got a big event coming up on September the 19th, our inaugural partner event. We’re having that at BT Tower. I think it will be one of the last events before it is turned into a hotel. We’re going to have upwards of 90 partners and are positioning it as an innovation summit. We’re inviting new partners and existing partners to come along and hear industry leaders talking about AI, about energy, about UCaaS, about connectivity, about mobile, about everything we do. I’m hoping that the content we deliver on the day will be very well received because we’re spending a lot of time with different vendors and different providers to make sure it is a joined up event. That’s the biggest thing we’re working on at the moment. MP: That and continuing to harvest ideas, to speak to people on the ground, to get together a couple of resellers with similar customer bases operating in similar spaces that might not necessarily compete with each other and to get our management team in there to gain insight into what they’re after, what they’re seeing in the market, whether we’re going in the right direction, feedback on our platforms, portals etc. And actually take on board what’s going on and adjust next year’s plan accordingly. These are edited highlights of a video interview between James Goulding, Editor of Technology Reseller magazine, and Mark Pillow and Paul Gibbs of VOIP Unlimited. The interview can be seen in full on technologyreseller.uk, in the Video Interviews column on the left of the home page or scan the QR code above. TR: How are you helping resellers hit that long tail of very small businesses? PG: Through awareness. The market is huge but the uptake has been incredibly slow because no one at the microbusiness end believes the switch-off is going to happen. Small to medium businesses and enterprises know it’s happening. They’ve had it rammed down their throats, but the micro businesses absolutely haven’t. We’ve built a product set that enables that, which we’ve had in our portfolio for over a year. It’s now about getting the message out to resellers – we’ve got this product, this is what it looks like, these are the commercials, this is the margin opportunity. We’ve spent a lot of time building marketing materials, resources that partners can take out into their local communities to help people to understand what’s going to happen. TR: Obviously, the switch-off is a big opportunity for resellers. Are there any others on your radar? PG: We can’t get away from AI. That gets talked about a lot. Microsoft has helped us along a bit with Copilot and ChatGPT. Everyone thinks that is AI, but there’s so much more you can do with it. That’s probably the next opportunity. How do we shape business for the next 5 or 10 years using AI and using it in the best way? Not taking away from that personal touch but making business easier to do. How can I shape my customer experience using AI? That’s where the end user, the business owner will benefit. We’ve built a lot of resource, we’ve spent a lot of time researching the market and we now feel ...continued Q&A High-level talks On September 19, Voip Unlimited is holding an invitation-only Innovation Summit Partner Event in the BT Tower, London. Likely to be one of the last events at the iconic location before it is turned into an hotel, the VU Innovation Summit is sponsored by ProVu, GoTalk AI, Telavox, Inform Billing, Fidelity Energy and Neural Voice. The VU Innovation Summit will give select partners valuable insights into the latest trends and innovations in the industry, including AI, cybersecurity, billing, energy, distribution and UCaaS. Highlights include keynotes from a renowned futurologist, who will share strategies for leveraging design thinking, psychology and computing to drive innovation, and from a cybersecurity expert, who will address the human element in cybersecurity. Sponsors will explore how AI is transforming productivity and customer interactions, optimising sales and support processes and driving business growth through efficiency gains. Watch the full interview
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