At a gala reception in Monte Casino’s ballroom last night, three of HP’s most dedicated partner companies – First Technology, Datacentrix and Aptronics – saw their years of loyalty rewarded as they took home the lion’s share of partner awards available. By Mark Davison
The three companies took home 20 trophies between them, which included top honours for Aptronics as Overall Partner of the Year for HP Enterprise Group and First Technology as PPS Overall Partner of the Year.
In the equally prestigious Channel Executive Awards category for individual executives, Jamie Scott from Tarsus was recognised as PPS’s Executive of the Year and AxizWorkgroup’s Pierre Spies was named Enterprise Group’s Executive of the Year.
First Technology won seven company awards and two individual awards; Datacentrix five company awards and one individual; and Aptronics four company and one individual award.
All three CEO’s of the companies – Arnold Sharpe (First Technology); Ahmed Mohammed (Datacentrix) and Appie Pema (Aptronics) – expressed their pride in their individual companies’ achievements and praised their respective teams.
But after a paltry haul (in his eyes) of one company award and two individual awards from HP last year, Aptronics’ Pema was obviously ecstatic with the company’s performance this year.
“I decided to take a bit of a sabbatical last year, which always sounds like a good idea,” Pema said, gesturing towards a trophy-laden table. “But this year I’m back … and with a little bit of hard work and a great team effort, look what happens!”
All the categories and award winners at this year’s HP Partner Awards were as follows:

PartnerOne Category
PPS Business Partner of the Year: Value Corporation
Enterprise Group Business Partner: Velocity Group
PPS Silver Partner: CEOS Technologies
EG Silver Partner: Sizwe Africa IT Group
PPS Gold Partner: Business Connexion
EG Gold Partner: Dimension Data
PPS Consumer Partner: Makro
EG Platinum Partner: Aptronics
PPS Platinum Partner: First Technology

Specialisation Category
Networking Partner of the Year: Datacentrix
Thin Client and Virtualisation Partner: First Technology
Storage Partner: Datacentrix
Workstation Partner: EOH
Server Partner: Aptronics
Channel MPS Partner: First Technology
Cloud Partner: Aptronics
Supplies Partner: First Technology
Enterprise Group ServiceOne Partner: Datacentrix
Retail POS Partner: Datacentrix
PPS ServiceOne Partner: First Technology

Software Category
IT Management Partner of the Year: SAP
Big Data Partner of the Year: Cornastone
Enterprise Security Partner of the Year: Dynamic Recovery Services (DRS)

Individual Category
Channel’s Most Certified Person: Nelson Gomes, Reflex Solutions
Outstanding Channel Technical Person: Duncan Human, EOH
Outstanding Channel Service: Adele Schoonwinkel, Aptronics
PPS Distribution Category Product Manager: Lizelle le Roux, Tarsus
EG Distribution Category Product Manager: Ketan Jeevan, AxizWorkgroup
Outstanding PPS Channel Sales Ambassador: Craig Stanton, First Technology
Outstanding EG Brand Ambassador: Hanlie Albertse, Gijima
Outstanding PPS Channel Ambassador: Hannes Steyn, First Technology
Outstanding EG Channel Ambassador: Tony de Sousa, Datacentrix

Distributor Category
Enterprise Group Distributor of the Year: AxizWorkgroup
PPS Supplies Distributor of the Year: Kolok
PPS Hardware Distributor of the Year: Tarsus

Alliances Category
Most Valued Systems Integrator: Accenture
Most Valued Independent Software Vendor: Microsoft
PPS Alliance Partner of the Year: Intel

Coastal Awards Category
PPS Coastal Partner of the Year: First Technology, KZN
Enterprise Group Coastal Partner of the Year: Datacentrix

Overall Partner Awards Category
Enterprise Group Partner of the Year: Aptronics
PPS Partner of the Year: First Technology

HP Channel Executive Awards Category
PPS Executive of the Year: Jamie Scott, Tarsus
Enterprise Group Executive of the Year: Pierre Spies, AxizWorkgroup