Top managers of MERLION and representatives of major IT manufacturers met with their partners from full-range distribution division to discuss the development vectors for mutual cooperation.
At the end of June, MERLION conducted IT-Forum MERLION’2013, its annual field meeting, in Budapest. Traditionally, the Forum brought together over a hundred participants. This time, the meeting was mainly focused on getting to know each other and communicating with the partners that are only starting their work with the major Russian distributor, i.e., with the Full-Range Distribution Division of MERLION. Among the issues considered by the participants of IT-Forum MERLION’2013 were building efficient cooperation with partners; services expected by partners from vendors and the distributor, and the services which the latter are ready to offer; finding the most efficient interaction models; consideration of distinctions in the regions and each partner’s business in particular, etc.
Day One. Arrival
Budapest welcomed the conference participants with cool cloudy weather, which could not spoil the impression from a delightful sightseeing tour of the beautiful city called the Pearl of the Danube. The first day would not have been complete without a get-to-know dinner at one of Budapest’s national restaurants. An intense business day lay ahead for the partners.
Day Two. On MERLION’s E-commerce and Much More
The first day of IT-Forum MERLION’2013 was opened with a speech of Nikolay Orlov, Sales Director of Full-Range Distribution Division at MERLION. Following an overview of the company and its leading position at the Russian market, as well as the company events over the past two years, Nikolay familiarized the participants with the corporate structure of its division. He then told in every detail about the benefits of working with the company, describing in particular the e-commerce technologies, such as B2B portal which has been operating for over 10 years at MERLION. This was a kind of an online platform for partner purchases which also publishes real-time information on new product deliveries and current special offers, i.e., everything that could assist partners in product purchases, promotion and sales. Nikolay further announced that, in addition to the operating B2B portal, MERLION was preparing to launch one more electronic platform that would help partners not only save time but also cut their own costs by acquiring access to the main MERLION’s resource, i.e., goods, before they even arrive at the partners’ warehouse.
Ivan Kaygorodtsev, Director of Franchising Development Department of the nation-wide chain of computer stores POSITRONICA was the next to speak to the partners. He dwelt in detail on the benefits and advantages of opening a retail store under the nation-wide trademark, providing several examples of successful partners that have already become leaders at the computer retail market in their regions.
ASUS was represented at the Forum by Sergey Oreshkin, Regional Partner Manager (South) and Evelina Shchedrina, Sales Representative. They drew the attention of the audience to the trends at the mobile equipment market and discussed the products currently offered by the above manufacturer in this segment and the marketing services the partners can receive in support of ASUS product sales.
The main innovations, capabilities and benefits of the new Windows 8 Operating System were described in detail in the presentation of ‘Windows 8: New Era’ by Aleksey Fedorov, Marketing Manager for Windows, Microsoft Corporation.
Aleksey Ivanov, Intel’s Distribution Director in Russia and CIS, familiarized the Forum participants with Intel’s business trends in 2013.
Vladimir Rusakov, Sales Director of Nippon Klick Corporation, made a presentation on the topic: ‘Why Work with Leaders? News and Trends of Digma, Jetbalance, Ippon, Oklick, PC Pet Trademarks’. The presentation contained a lot of information of interest for the partners, including the main trends at the markets for the above brands; changes in demand and average prices; competitors’ mistakes; and changes of the corporation’s products in accordance with the consumer changes. An extremely wide product range, a flexible pricing policy, 466 service centers in 158 cities of the RF are only a few factors encouraging cooperation with Nippon Klick Corporation.
At the end of the first day of the conference, participants made an unforgettable trip to a real horse farm, where they could enjoy a horse-team ride, see a marvelous horse show performed by professionals and participate in the ‘Olympics’ Hungarian style. Teams competed in such events as archery, throwing timber and forks, ring toss, etc. Everyone was in the spirit of the game, and the competition was serious!
Day Three. Vendor Is a Partner’s Friend!
The second business day of IT-Forum MERLION’2013 began with a speech by Olesya Karmanova, Key Partner Manager from Acer. She presented a line of information visualization devices, i.e., Acer projectors for home and business, which have already gained recognition among the Russian consumers due to their high technical properties.
Samsung was represented on the Forum by Stanislav Yerofeyev, a dealer network development specialist. His speech was devoted to printing equipment from Samsung. The audience was presented with the whole range of solutions for home and office, innovations within the framework of product range update, as well as the conditions and benefits of the 2013 partner program.
HP printers and genuine consumables, their efficiency and reliability, as well as their competitive advantages were discussed by Yevgeniy Mikhaylov, HP Partner Manager.
Sergey Suvorov, General Manager of iRU, presented his speech ‘PC Transformation’. In his presentation, Sergey dwelt on the scope of technology production by iRU and the advantages of such technology; mentioning the current Russian PC market environment, the speaker touched upon the disadvantages of ‘self-assembly’, which is still present in the regions of the RF. Sergey familiarized the participants with the range of the products manufactured by his company, including traditional PCs for home and office, powerful gaming computers, workstations and servers, compact all-in-one PCs and nettops, as well as mobile PCs, such as laptops, ultrabooks and tablet PCs, including special models for schoolchildren. Sergey also mentioned that iRU, a brand with 10 years of history, has been included in the list of Top-3 Russian PC manufacturers for several years already. Direct supply from hardware and software manufacturers, awards from such giants as Microsoft and Intel are all a guarantee of the top quality of iRU products at a moderate price. All of the above factors promise great earning opportunities for partners together with iRU.
After the day’s session, partners had personal meetings where they could discuss in detail their individual interests and situations with MERLION’s managers and representatives of the manufacturers.
Days Four and Five. Sightseeing
The greatest delight is when one can relax a bit after productive work. In this case, relaxation was interesting and informative: all members of IT-Forum MERLION’2013 went to see the ancient Hungarian settlements of Visegrad and Szentendre.
In Visegrad, they visited the Visegrad Fortress (1259), which had resisted many sieges, and lost most of its buildings but Solomon’s Tower that remains until today. Its powerful walls reach eight meters in thickness, and now it is one of the highest and most impressive Roman fortifications in Roman style preserved in Europe.
Afterwards, the participants enjoyed themselves in a lovely town of Szentendre (founded by the Serbians in the 17th century), known as a town of artist with a great number of galleries and shops, souvenir and antique stores.
The above was followed by a delicious lunch in an authentic Hungarian restaurant with a breathtaking view over the Danube. Despite the rain covering Szentendre and despite being wet to the bone, everyone had a great time.
In the evening, there was a gala dinner where Mister Budapest 2013 was elected, and then there was dancing, and more dancing!
