Panel Discussion Session - CMO at 20th Star Nite Awards 2021

The VAR Symposium Session started with the first Panel discussion, where there were seven Chief Marketing Officers and marketing leaders from the Industry participating as the panellists. They were Mr. Ramesh Natarajan, CEO- Redington India, Mr. Naved Chaudhary, Head of marketing- Ingram Micro India, Mr. Rahul Singh, VP & Head of Marketing- SAP India, Mr. Kaustubh Patki, Marketing Head- Micro Focus India, Mr. Jagannathn Chelliah, Director Marketing- Western Digital, Ms. Arpita Sengupta, Director & Head of Mktg. Red Hat India and Ms. Vaishali B Shivshankar, Head of Mktg. - Rackspace Technology. The session was moderated by Dr. Deepak Kumar Sahu, Chief Editor- VARINDIA.

Panelists felt that, digital transformation as a way to solve problems for consumers can only happen when it is simultaneously used to support internal processes which contribute to those consumer experiences.

The VAR Symposium continued with the presentation from Nine OEMs, where they shared their channel and GTM strategy targeting partners in the country. The presenters were Mr. Bishwajit Sutradhar, National Sales Head, Passive Networking Business, Polycab, Mr Amit Kapoor, Business Manager- Channels & Distribution, HPE India, Mr. Ganesan Arumugam, Director-Channel Sales-India & SAARC- NetApp India, Mr. Neerav Kumar, Director Sales, Strategic Business- CommScope, Mr. Krunal Patel, Director-TeamViewer, Mr. Sumit Kumar, Regional Head for North & East India, Bangladesh & Nepal – Kaspersky, Mr. Ramanan Chidambaram, Director – Sales, Fortinet India, Mr. Amarish Karnik, Channel sales Director (India & SAARC) - Veeam Software and Mr. Rameesh Kailasam, CEO - India Tech

Panel Discussion Session - VARs at 20th Star Nite Awards 2021

The Corporate presentations were followed by the second panel discussion session with six VARs from the Indian Tech industry participating in the session. They were Mr. Ranjan Chopra, Chairman & Managing Director- Team Computers, Mr. Ajay Sawant, Managing Director- Orient Technologies, Ms. Prarthana Gupta, CEO- Cache Digitech, Mr. N. K. Mehta, Managing Director & CEO - Secure Network, Mr. Vipul Datta, CEO- Futuresoft Solutions Pvt. Ltd. and Mr. Atul Ahuja, Sr. Vice President (Middle East, Africa & ASIA) - Softline Group. The session was again moderated by Dr. Deepak Kumar Sahu, Chief Editor-VARINDIA.
Partners felt that Digital transformation is an ongoing process and there is a strong focus on technology and modernization. The transformation is an opportunity to gain strategic and competitive advantage through IT infrastructure capabilities.
The Partners got a glimpse about the industry during the two panel discussion sessions by the CMOs and VARs who shared their viewpoints. The Theme of the Panel Discussions was “Partner Transformation Key Enabler For Effective Business Transformation”.

Inaugural Session at 20th Star Nite Awards 2021

The evening session, which happens to be the most awaited and exciting session every year, commenced with Ms. S Mohini Ratna, Editor, VARINDIA speaking about the importance and the methodologies of the Channel Leadership Survey, followed by the welcome address by Mr. Manoj Chugh- President Group Public Affairs & Member - Group Executive Board- Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd., an address by Mr. Amit Sharma, IT Secy, J&K and Mr. Deepak Chanduka, DDG (Spl. Projects) - USOF, DoT. There were three Corporate presentations by Mr. Shantaram Shinde, National Channel Head- NTT Ltd., Mr. Anshuman Rai, Area Vice President (India & South Asia) - CommVault and Mr. Sanjiv Krishen, Chairman - IRIS Global Services Pvt. Ltd.

The event’s exciting moment was the recognition of 10 Chief Marketing Officers, and the felicitation of 40 corporates recognised for their leadership in their respective product and solution categories and 3 corporates recognised in the Editor’s Choice awards category.

This was followed by the recognition of Five IT Associations in the country, who have done great work for the members and the growth of the industry. The IT associations which were felicitated were PCAIT- Delhi, TAIT- Mumbai, COMPASS- Kolkata, ISODA and ASIRT, followed by the presentation from Mr. Kaushik P Pandya, President- FAIITA, where he spoke about the “India IT Mall”.

At the end there was Tech talk session, which was an extempore session for 5 min., there were three corporates who presented on the emerging trends and how they are pitching their products in the market. The presenters were Mr. Dinesh Kukreja, CEO- Unicas Services LLP, Mr. Sunil Sharma, Managing Director (Sales)- Sophos and Mr. Manoj Taskar, Country Manager-India- Anomali.

The outcome of the event is that newer technologies bring newer disruptions, challenges and also opportunities for growth but at the same time the issues of Cyber security will remain a challenge. As we prepare to leave 2021 behind, the new year will see us in the next normal. Things have changed irreversibly and many more changes are yet to come. We can only succeed if we really collaborate with each, playing to our strengths and helping the entire ecosystem to grow.

The year 2021 has taught us that collective alignment toward a common objective is a critical component required to achieve worthwhile outcomes and sustainable, long-term success. It is high time for the partners to develop the digital entrepreneurial spirit among themselves by redefining the business process.

We would like to extend a heartfelt thanks to all those who have attended the first of it's kind Hybrid event(Physical and Virtual) which was held on 26th November' 21, Friday.