March has not been a good month for some, as an ill wind has been blowing through our industry and several people have lost their jobs, for one reason or another.
It’s tough out there for employers and employees. An example of this is David Petrook who was the Commercial Director, at Synectics, he has left after just a brief ten months; apparently the company asked him to move to Sheffield to be closer to the office so he could fulfil his duties better, but David did not want to move his wife and his young family up that far north so they have decided to go in different directions, likewise they have pulled out of exhibiting at our event (here’s a picture of me MC-ing at ST16 Nottingham). We were able to fill the space from our long waiting list and as HKC, the intrusion detector and control panel company in Oldham, were next on the waiting list they will now be joining us for the first time and we will have to see what’s going on at Synectics. Also Steve Proctor has been made redundant from Panasonic after being there for just under three years; and Geoff Bowers who was the sales and marketing director has also fallen foul of the redundancy hammer at Geoquip who have let him go after just eight months. Which is a great shame, as he really thought he had found his home and it seems he was doing really well? So if you are looking for some good guys, well here are a few, and I can put you in contact with them if you want me to.
Y3K BDM
However having more luck out there is Mike Barrett, who you may recall was over at CBC, he was actually there for 18 years, can you believe, any way he has become the BDM (business development manager) for Y3K, while Dave Watkins has moved to Acam Technology as sales director, I am not sure but I think he had a connection with these in his distant past. Y3K have also taken on another guy that you will know, who starts with them in May, not sure if I can tell you who that is yet; but Valentine’s day will give you a clue; email me if you think you know who it is. Guesses to me so far have been someone called Valentine (you’re warm!?) and February (wrong!) and my wife (it’s not her!).
Remember Roy-sec?
Ian Galloway has joined Avigilon as business development manager for national accounts. As far as I remember Ian has been in the industry since around 1996. I first met him when he worked for Sanyo when I was at the distributor MVD. He attended one of our regional roadshows, yep, the ones that become known as Roy-sec, at Woburn Abbey and we became mates since then. You may not know but Ian has a beautiful villa in Turkey in a very quiet location and miles away from any town, which he hires out. I have been there and I am going back, look it up if you fancy it; it’s called Villa Serenity; just click on that link, or tap Villa Serenity into a search engine.
Milton returns
Now it seems that after taking a break out of the industry for around three years Milton Worm has come back; you see, our industry is just so great people just can’t leave it. Milton has joined IC Realtime as technical sales executive. Milton has been in the industry for many years, he spent a couple of years at Genie you may recall, in 2007.
In brief
At Cathexis EU, Martin Jones has become BDM. The access control manufacturer in Poole, TDSi has appointed Neil Hughes as its new channel partner manager; he has some 29 years of experience in the security industry. He’ll be working with TDSi’s southern channel partner manager Alex Rumsey. I was all ready to go with telling you who’s joining EZCCTV as an area sales manager for the Midlands and south west, when Joss Cohen asked me to hold fire. So I’ll just have to tell you that just joined is Daisy Reid as an internal sales person. And Tony Norton joins HBL Security as their new regional sales manager. And staying with distributors, DVS Ltd, in Cardiff, has appointed John Symons as area sales manager, to support southern UK customers. He previously worked at Norbain.
Name change
Samsung Techwin Europe Limited, the video surveillance product company, from April 1, is operating under the name Hanwha Techwin Europe Limited. Bob (HY) Hwang PhD, President, Samsung Techwin Europe said: “One year ago we made the announcement that Samsung Techwin had become a part of the Hanwha Group. While our name is changing, the innovation, quality and reliability of our products will remain the same.” The same goes for their factories, sales companies and channel partners which remain unchanged.
