The DQ Week Madras announced the Annual Channel Partner Awards for the southern re-gion at a function held at Chennai’s GRT Grand Convention Center on October 13. The awards function, the second since its launch, was held to celebrate the success of various channel partners in partnership with Ingram Micro India.

S P Rajguru (right), acting country head, Ingram Micro India, giving the Best Retailer Award for the Chennai region to A Thasthageer of SSS Systems	Shyam Malhotra (right) giving the Best System Integrator award for the Chennai region to Anoop Balaraman and Ratna Kumar of CCS Infotech

South India has approximately 6,000 channel partners operating either as resellers, dealers, systems integrators, value-added resellers or retailers. In fact, Chennai alone has more than 1,000 channel partners. Until a few years ago, there was little media attention to this critical, emerging community. These awards now recognize the contributions of channel partners across 17 cities of south India. In his opening remarks, The DQ Week chief editor Prasanto K Roy said: “The Channel Awards were instituted last year to recognize and merit the channel community where 80% of the IT business happens.”

Shyam Malhotra (right), Editor-in-Chief, Cyber Publications, giving the joint Best Reseller Award for the Chennai region to Shantilal DJ of Devraj Computers	Shyam Malhotra (right) giving the joint Best Reseller Award for the Chennai region to A Jitendra Jain of Supreme Computers

The awards for Chennai had three categories—Retailer, Systems Integrator and Reseller. A relatively new entrant into the Chennai market—Access—was given the Most Promising Retailer award. While SSS Systems bagged the Best Retailer award, GBS Systems & Services had to remain content with the runner-up award in the Retailer category. In the Systems Integration category, CCS Infotech received the Best Systems Integrator award while the runner-up award went to Precision Techserve. Devraj Computers and Supreme Computers jointly won the Best Reseller award. The runner-up trophy went to Universal Micro Systems. A number of parameters like credibility, financial strength, sales, service attitude and long-term commitment were taken into account by the jury. The awards were given away by Cyber Publications Editor-in-Chief Shyam Malhotra, Prasanto Roy, Ingram Micro India acting country head S P Rajguru, TVS Electronics head (sales & service) John Aravamuthan, Ganapathy Raman and HCL Peripherals executive VP S Pattabiraman. More than 350 channel partners from Chennai and other major cities of the south attended the function.

CYBER NEWS SERVICE/Chennai