Counterparts Technology may be just three years old but in that time it has amassed an impressive customer list featuring some of Australia’s most well-respected and well-known brands including Macquarie University Hospital, Aussie, the Art Gallery of NSW, Racing NSW and Fastway Couriers.
Key to the company’s success has been its ability to deliver competitive solutions using leading technology. As a partner of HPE, Counterparts Technology instantly saw the benefit of joining the Arrow APEX program to further deepen its HPE capabilities, according to Counterparts Technology strategic alliance director, Kirk Jones.
“I’ve been around for a while now, and having worked with all the distributors over the years I’ve become familiar with their value-adds,” he said. “We already had a relationship with the Arrow team around some other vendor’s products, but then they approached us to let us know about the APEX program which, I admit, I hadn’t heard of before. I saw instantly that it offered a lot of value-add as far as pre-sales support and technical certification were concerned. For a small business like us, those are major benefits.
“Certification, in particular, can be very expensive and time consuming. Based on that, we saw Arrow APEX as a really good program that would help us grow our business and provide our teams with expertise we wouldn’t otherwise have access to.”
Startup businesses need to run lean, and the focus on billable hours and productivity needs to be absolute. With limited technical resources, to send staff to certification training can have a draining effect on the health of the business. The ability for the Arrow APEX program to provide a “boot camp” to help fast-track certification has been a major benefit to the Counterparts Technology business, according to Jones.
“We look at Arrow as a partner, not just a distributor. The support it provides is extensive. In addition to helping my team get their certifications in a more timely manner than having to do it themselves, the Arrow team itself has been a major resource both in terms of technical support and pre-sales assistance.”
Helping to win customers
Jones pointed to a customer Counterparts Technology won from a competitor even after the competitor had begun work on the project.
“The competitor had dropped the ball with this customer, and we were able to leverage our close relationship with Arrow to bring the customer to the Arrow demonstration centre, where Arrow’s technical and presales team were able to work directly with them to get a better understanding of the project,” he said.
“Our competitor was unable to provide this demonstration so we were able to take the lead on the playing field. Without being part of the Arrow Apex program such opportunities would have passed us by. It’s an example of why we see this program as adding real strategic value to our business.”
The Counterparts Technology team themselves also love what the Arrow APEX program offers, Jones said.
“APEX offers a sales incentive but that in itself is not what drives the team. It’s an additional benefit, but as far as the whole company is concerned, the real benefit is in having that access to the HPE experts at Arrow. It enables us to be more strategic with who we target.
“The APEX program is making the relationship between our two organisations even stronger, and even more of a genuine partnership.”
To find out more, visit the Arrow website here
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