Sundaresan Kanappan, Vice President & Country General Manager, India, Tech Data
Braving challenges posed by COVID-19, Tech Data continues with its maket operations with care and sincerity. In an interaction with Digital Edge, Sundaresan Kanappan, Vice President & Country General Manager, India, Tech Data, talk about the challenges and opportunities emerging during this Pandemic. !
As an IT distributor, having Pan India supply chain, how do you look back at the two months’ extreme nation-wide lockdown?
IT distributors have taken a center stage during the time of this pandemic, playing a key role in keeping companies connected to their customers. We’re working closely as a team with our vendors to understand where supply chain challenges may arise and how best those risks can be mitigated with proactive planning. Our channel partner teams are working closely with their Tech Data sales teams to anticipate product needs and are always on the run to cater the in-time solutions.
We’re making best efforts with a well-thought-out strategy to mitigate service disruptions to our channel partners. Specific related actions include working with vendors to preempt potential disruptions and overcome or avoid them by maintaining adequate supply. In addition, we are monitoring vendor backlogs and shipments along with their delivery acknowledgement dates to be on time. The recovery plan of Tech Data continues to evolve with the market and ever-changing dynamics of the pandemic.
Do you think the government should have put IT distribution into the strategic category so that movements of products and people calamities stay undisturbed?
The decision of enforcing the country wide lockdown was unprecedented and left various organizations with very limited time to preplan and mobilize resources. As a result, many challenges were faced in the field to cater to timely market requirements. There were substantial surges in demands as many organizations adopted the work-from-home (WFH) methodology and accelerated purchases of endpoint solutions like laptops, desktops and accessories. Tech Data’s focus is on protecting the health and well-being of our colleagues, while keeping the business running, supporting our channel partners and continuing to provide the best efforts to cater to the unprecedented surge of essential business requirements.
What are the challenges you face in terms of ensuring the safety of your employees and continuation of your business operations in the country?
Tech Data continues to monitor the COVID-19 developments with a primary focus on the health and safety of its employees while mitigating business impacts to its channel partners. Tech Data has activated its global business continuity plan and is organizing regular virtual meetings with teams across the business. As part of this, we have circulated safety guidelines for our internal and external stakeholders. We’ve taken steps, for the safety of our employees like suspending all business travel and face-to-face meetings, with nearly 100 percent of our office-based colleagues working from home.
Our business continuity efforts include measures to mitigate impacts to our stakeholders as we define the ‘new normal’. We’re creating global return-to-office guidelines and protocols, designed to be cautious, flexible and rigorous while taking a gradual, methodical and measured approach. In this challenging situation, Tech Data remains committed to protecting the health and well-being of its employees, supporting channel partners and continuing to remain transparent with regular communication updates, and to provide the best possible service levels.
Have you re-strategized your supply chain and warehouse management operations?
Although our supply chain was impacted due to the nationwide lockdown, our logistics business operations were able to continue to support essential services providers including banks, hospitals and government sectors. Tech Data has implemented a robust business continuity plan that allows us to continue to serve our customers with minimal disruptions.
Do you think PCs, especially laptops, register higher demand as enterprises and organizations want to equip their workforces with PCs?
During this time of uncertainty, IT vendors are aligning their strategies to be customer driven and guiding customers along their digital journeys. Customers are increasingly dependent on technology to help them maintain business continuity through working from home.
Not all organizations have the culture or the experience in enabling a remote workforce. The increased capacity load on network, cloud and other technologies is unparalleled. Considerable organizations have provided work from home, with an uptake of video meetings, audio conference calls, and collaboration platforms.
Overall, the pandemic has brought along an increasing need for organizations to adapt swiftly to changing business dynamics, especially with remote work and continued digital transformation. With its end-to-end portfolio across devices, advanced data center solutions and next-generation technologies, Tech Data has been able to help its customers to address these challenges.
Though depressing, what opportunities has COVID brought to the IT distribution business?
While the outbreak has negatively impacted the overall sentiment of enterprise spend–especially among sectors like travel, retail, hospitality, supply chains, and manufacturing –it also heightens the need for enterprises to bolster remote working capabilities and digital collaboration infrastructure. As a result, the ongoing situation presents opportunities in the adoption of cloud infrastructure. At the same time, there is a clear demand for robust IT infrastructures.
Do you think the inauguration of Yotta Infrastructure’s NM1 datacenter in Mumbai gives out a strong message that India has kept its pace in terms of creating new datacenters even during pandemic?
It is a positive sign during these challenging times. It gives confidence and momentum to organization within and outside India to keep investing as the dependency on technology continues to grow. Also, this sends a clear message that India is making progress in its endeavor to build a robust digital infrastructure under the Digital India initiative initiated by the incumbent government.
In the war against COVID, how much support do you get from your Vendors?
We understand the importance of Tech Data’s ability to provide our channel partners with necessary assistance that enable them to maintain their product supply and serve their customers.
We’ve been conducting channel partner events virtually and have received extremely positive feedback on this new approach so far. Numerous trainings and partner enablement programs are planned to provide them with a well-defined go-to-market strategies to sell business solutions to existing and new partners.
In addition, it is important to stay connected with partners during these challenging times as situations can change quickly alongside the needs for vendor support.
Do you still believe that the remaining months would see demands picking up and the revenues would come out unscathed by March 31st 2021.
We’ve a global crisis management team that reviews processes and adapts our strategies to changing market conditions. The pandemic has brought an increasing need for all organizations, including Tech Data, to adapt to swiftly changing business dynamics, especially with remote work and continued digital transformation, along with end point consumer solutions. While it is too early to estimate any impact and demand conditions in a fluid situation, Tech Data has proven its ability to be flexible and is well positioned to continue to provide our customers with their business IT needs and deliver our service levels with minimal disruptions.
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