Feedback from the partners: the regional forum MERLION Business Channel in Irkutsk

On the 17th of June this year the annual field MBC conference for the partners from the Siberian federal district was held in the business complex “Baikal Business Center” in Irkutsk. About 60 representatives of the key IT companies of the region, the world’s suppliers of computer hardware (INTEL, GIGABYTE, Kingmax, LG, Microsoft, Samsung) and top managers of MERLION company took part in the event. This year partners from Abakan, Angarsk, Bratsk, Zheleznogorsk, Кrasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Ulan-Ude and other cities of the region gathered at the forum.

Nickolay Orlov, Director of sales department ofMERLION, greeted the guests of the conference, he appeared with the presentation «MERLION. 2010: the dynamics is stable». In his report N. Orlov familiarized the Siberian partners with the company’s news, presented new projects and prospective trends for the joint business development. Going on with the official part of the conference the representatives of vendors appeared with their business presentations describing to the Siberian partners the state-of-art at the world’s computer market, announcing new products and sharing the plans for the nearest future.

Alexei Strouzhkov, LG partner relationship specialist, presented the report «LG monitors: positions at the market and future considerations» where he presented modern monitor models to the Siberians and emphasized the principal benefits of LG products: high quality, innovations and unique patented technology, reasonable prices.

Sergey Shtertser, sales supporting engineer of INTEL, went on with the report «Plans of the adoption of the new Core processor range within the table, mobile and server sections in 2010». In his report he presented the range of new INTEL processors to the partners, told about the principal advantages for the consumers adopting new processors and described in detail the joint programs that are organized in MERLION company in the current quarter.

Vasily Konstantinov, partner relationship manager of Microsoft, Eastern Siberia, presented the report «Important changes in the distribution channel for MS Office 2010». From his report the participants of the forum knew about the existing operating systems of the manufacturer, competitive advantages and the changes in the product promotion in the Russian market. Besides V. Konstantinov presented the marketing programs of the vendor that are organized in MERLION company.

Denis Vernikov, strategic client relationship manager of Samsung, appeared with the presentation «Samsung – new monitors and printers, summer 2010». D. Vernikov told to the partners about the new trends in monitor design and production, presented interesting new models (for example, a LED-monitor PX2370 with an exquisite transparent stand; a stylish sensor-controlled monitor LD220Z). Besides he familiarized the guests of the seminar with the novelties in the sphere of Samsung printing devices for domestic purposes and for small- and medium scale business. In the end of his speech he specified the benefits of the vendor’s partnership program in 2010.

Yuri Vilensky, destination representative of GIGABYTE in Siberia and the Far East, demonstrated to the participants of the conference his presentation «GIGABYTE – Innovations and Quality» in which he told about the manufacturer’s products, and also announced the focus models of motherboards based on INTEL Core in 2010. Apart from that distinguished guests, c-suite of GIGABYTE company visited the conference in Irkutsk: Sinclair Hsiao, sales and marketing director in Europe, Russia and CIS countries, Boris Chen, Head of GIGABYTE representative office in Moscow, and Joseph Liang, sales manager in Russia. It is interesting that it was not the first visit of such distinguished guests to the Baikal. For example, last year Laurent Binetti, the representative of an American corporation DELL (Regional Manager Emerging Europe Dell EC EMEA Commercial), visited the MERLION Business Channel conference.

Olga Faleeva, purchase manager for the Flash-disks category of goods in MERLION, completed the presentation module with her report « Kingmax series: development strategy in 2010», in which she presented to the partners the whole model range of the manufacturer, described the competitive advantages of Kingmax products and the company’s plans for the current year.

After the business presentations the participants of the forum went on with feedbacks within the framework of roundtable discussions. The new framework of the conference started in 2010 assumes functional communication between the partners, vendors and the administration of MERLION company in order to solve the current issues and objectives. In every city the partners are suggested to present to the audience a product of a vendor quickly, lively and convincingly. The game that traditionally concludes the official part of every MBC forum went on actively and excitingly in Irkutsk. The presentations of the LG and GIGABYTE roundtables were by common consent considered the most colorful and unusual. But the official part came to an end soon, and the guests of the forum had a chance to talk to their colleagues in a warm and friendly atmosphere and to spend a pleasant summer evening on the Baikal soil.