CRN says, "Cloud Distribution hires ‘heavy hitter' for growth assault"

Distributor poaches Palo Alto man James Sherlow to head services and help assess new vendor signings

Hot on the heels of being crowned the UK's fourth-fastest-growing private tech firm, Cloud Distribution has moved to enlist a technical services director.

James Sherlow joins the A10, Aerohive and Lastline distributor from Palo Alto Networks, where he was cyber-security solutions manager for western Europe and Africa.

Cloud's business development director Adam Davison said Sherlow would help the distributor run the rule over prospective vendor signings and build out its "Cloud Cover" portfolio of reseller services.

Cloud Cover, which encompasses pre-sales; implementation; training and certification; and maintenance and support services, is growing rapidly and needed a director in situ, Davison said.

"James is a heavy hitter – he ran a big portion of Palo Alto's EMEA SE team and was the second man in Europe," Davison said. "It validates our growth that someone of this stature sees the excitement and opportunity in what we are doing.

"When we look at new vendors, James will give us another viewpoint on how the market sees the technology."

In taking the job, Sherlow will be reunited with two former colleagues in Davison and Cloud Distribution co-founder Scott Dobson, all three of whom held leadership positions at WAN optimisation vendor Expand Networks in the early noughties.

Founded in 2009, Cloud Distribution grew rapidly on the back of its partnership with wireless vendor Meraki but now counts A10, Aerohive, Lastline, WatchDox, Tibco among its key vendors.

"We have hit that level of growth where we need a technical director and James is one of the best people in the market we could have put in the role," Davison said

http://www.channelweb.co.uk/crn-uk/news/2391594/cloud-distribution-hires-heavy-hitter-for-growth-assault