Spark Technologies strives to upskill its team in terms of technology and trends

KUSHAGAR BUDHWAR
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SPARK TECHNOLOGIES

The market is rapidly evolving with technology cycles becoming shorter, and staying aligned with vendor roadmaps while educating partners in time is a constant effort. Additionally, finding and retaining skilled talent who understand both the technical and business aspects of distribution has become rather imperative.

“I wouldn’t call it a Challenge as for us being a value added distributor it is the need of our business and for us to being able to manage consistent growth while maintaining the high-touch, value-added services our partners expect,” says Kushagar Budhwar, Executive Director, Spark Technologies. “Also, we have to accept the fact that we are representatives of the OEM and hence a mutually agreed SOP should be in place to run that particular business. A SOP that can provide more structured enablement for partners in both technical and commercial aspects. Having this in place would also create clearer pricing models and better integration with distributor platforms, and faster onboarding processes which would significantly improve efficiency.”

For distributors, it is imperative to evolve as per industry trends and technological evolution. Spark Technologies always pushes its team to upskill themselves in terms of technology and trends.

“Our team also seeks continuous training on the latest technologies from our vendors particularly around cyber security, AI, and infrastructure modernization. Additionally, being a VAD, there is a growing requirement for consultative selling skills so our team can better support partners in aligning technology to business outcomes,” cites Kushagar.

Kushagar further continues, “I think in the evolving world of technologies it is also important for not just OEM but also distributors to adapt with tools that help with deal registration, automated quoting, and pipeline visibility which would eventually be highly beneficial in improving our responsiveness and partner satisfaction.”

CLOUD-BASED VS SUBSCRIPTION-BASED MODEL

Over the past couple of years, Spark Technologies has made conscious efforts to add verticals that offer revenue through subscription offerings. While there’s still work to be done in adapting certain backend processes, the company has already started onboarding vendors and partners who operate within these models. The challenge now is scaling this side of the business while ensuring traditional operations continue to run smoothly.