Westron Communications

Market Turmoil? Bring It On! Why Everyone’s Watching Shoretel!

by Westron Communications on 08/04/10 at 8:37 pm

Holding steadfastly to their two core fundamentals, Shoretel has become quite the one to watch in Unified Communications

In the crowded UC space, Shoretel started out from humble beginnings and has ascended to a competitive position, standing against the formidable Avaya. And Shoretel’s ready for the challenge!

Here’s an excerpt from ChannelWeb’s recent interview with Shoretel CEO, John Combs:

Channel Web: ShoreTel posted some significant gains in 2009. I remember reading that ShoreTel had a stated goal of growing at least 5 percent in 2009, and you got there. What helped you do it?

Combs: In our business, there are basically two fundamental things you can control: product development — and our mantra is “best product” — and distribution. We have the best product. My investments are being made in three key areas: growing our sales team, growing our distribution partners and investing in our engineering team to enhance the product. In 2009, yes, we grew 5 percent, and candidly our objectives were much higher than that, but the economy was a challenge, and relative to other folks we did extremely well. We’ve grown distribution, and did a lot of lead generation activities to give our dealers prospects that they may not have found. We also added AT&T (NYSE:T), and during the period picked up Qwest (NYSE:Q) and Verizon (NYSE:VZ), and Telstra in Australia. They have all been big partners.

In the article, ChannelWeb writer Chad Berndtson, gets great insight from Combs on what Shoretel is doing to promote the company’s growth. He covers ShoreTel’s message to VARs and why they welcome the competition from the big guys.

Read ChannelWeb’s full article, ShoreTel CEO: The More Market Turmoil, The Better for Us.