Khali Henderson Blog 

"In a cold world, you need your friends to keep you warm." That's the tagline on the 1983 film (yes, it was that long ago), The Big Chill. And, it's appropo to the indirect channel, which answered Qwest's invitation to huddle together in Denver this week. The chilly temperatures in the mile-high city were not enough to keep 400 Qwest Business Partners from attending the telco's annual agent fair, Q.Marketplace, at the Denver Convention Center.

On Tuesday, light snow and bitterly cold air from the north brought temperatures in the low teens. For this visiting Phoenician, it was a bit of a shock to my system. The "brisk wallk" 100 yards from my hotel to the convention center gave new meaning to the conference theme: "Accelerate in '08."

However, I am sure the turn in the weather was welcomed for the Qwest Business Partners who planned to go to today's organized ski trip. (Look for more on that in future blogs.)

On Wednesday and Thursday, however, it was all business at Q.Marketplace. All-day training sessions preceded the Welcome Reception on Wednesday night. I've been going to the event for about four years, so there were a lot of familiar faces. Here's a few:

 
Qwest VP of Sales Sandy Spencer with PHONE+ Publisher Mike Saxby at the Q.Marketplace Welcome Reception in the Denver Convention Center on Wednesday

 
Troy and Trent McCracken, the brother duo that make up Spectrum Inc., at the Welcome Reception

Vimenture's Mark Sharp and McCartern's Tim Murphy at the reception.

PartnerTEL's Dan Bommer and Jason Shapiro chat with Qwest Channel Sales Manager Clay Ogata at the reception.

Avoda's Steve Mercado and Krista Puckett  with Tricom's Brian Deley at the reception.

CDW's Shane McNamara and Ian Keininger, who is a PHONE+ Advisory Board member and a recent PHONE+ cover boy.

The reception with hosted bar and buffet doubles as a product fair. One of the highlights was the video game Half Life on a giant flat-screen TV. It was a gamer's dream come true. Half Life is a multiplayer game with more than 300,000 simultaneous users and 10 million total users. The exhibit was not merely a distraction, but a demo of the carrier's capabilities. Qwest provides the Internet access and hosting in its Seattle CyberCenter for Valve, Half Life's publisher, according to Bob Daheln, Qwest marketing manager. Many agents and telecom managers are familiar with Half Life, so they are immediately interested in Qwest's support of the game, he says, noting it's a great way to showcase how Qwest's network can support business applications requiring high bandwidth, low latency and high availability.

PHONE+ Publisher Mike Saxby tests his gaming skills on Half Life.

Q.Marketplace continued on Thursday with presentations by Qwest's top executives. Since his predecessor Richard Notebaert was a regular speaker at the Q.Marketplace, Chairman and CEO Ed Mueller's absence at the event was a slight disappointment for some partners. Company spokesperson Melissa Reffel said the new exec had a scheduling conflict. Since introducing his company strategies in December, she said, he has his plate full integrating them throughout the company.

It's not exactly a doctor's note, but we'll give him a pass since Tom Richards, EVP of Qwest's Business Markets Group, did a nice job of distilling the five core strategies that will guide the company in 2008. These include:
1. Delivering simplified, integrated solutions
2. Expanding existing partnerships and forging new ones
3. Expanding broadband deployments
4. Focusing on productivity and cost savings
5. Balancing investment and shareholder return

Richards also took on responsibility for reviewing the company's financial picture, a role typically taken by the company's CFO. "We have reached a place of stability. Those of you who were here four or five years ago remember that stability looked like a pretty admirable target if you think about how Qwest was performing in the marketplace," he said. "We are at a point of stability. That's an incredible accomplishment, but as you might expect. We can't stand there. We can't stay." The challenge, he said, is for Qwest to become a growth company. 

Qwest's Tom Richards addresses QBPP members on Thursday at the Denver Convention Center. Next time you see him, ask him about his "lunch box." 

BMG (which includes QBPP) is expected to be the growth engine for Qwest in 2008. Richards said BMG, which experienced 11 percent year-over-year growth (as of 3Q 2007), has gained a reputation within the company for strong sales of strategic products, such as MPLS, Ethernet, call center and VoIP. BMG has a three-part strategy to continue its growth:
1. Deepen relationships with customers
2. Understand the value created by solving business problems
3. Expand and commercialize the investments in the Networx contract

In addition to outlining steps to continue the momentum, Richards credited the channel with pushing the company to be better. "One of the reasons we are better in BMG is because you guys put us there," he said. "Don't ever think that your challenging us and pushing us isn't healthy for us because it makes us better."

Along those lines, channel partners who attended Q.Marketplace, while generally complimentary of the carrier, were critical about ongoing difficulties with the ILEC's integrated access product. In his remarks, Erich Bozich, vice president of national network services, acknowledged the problems and discussed improvements and enhancements that are part of the company's 2008 product roadmap, which includes a SIP trunking launch in December and a VPLS rollout sometime in the second half of the year. Another exciting product offer will be the company's partnership with Cisco to deliver IA with Cisco's UC-500; that should be ready in the March/April timeframe with enhancements planned for the second half of the year.

Qwest's Eric Bozich gives partners a glimpse at the 2008 product roadmap.

Qwest's Tom McGrath offers agents a 2007 report card.

Tom McGrath, vice president of alternate channel sales, provided a report card for the QBPP. "We had a very good year in 2007," he said. "You folks are increasingly becoming an important part of BMG. By that I mean we are going to grow at a faster rate than the other channels in BMG. There is a lot of emphasis on our channel. There is a lot of support coming to our channel. And, with that, are huge expectations coming from our channel." 

In fact, he said, the success of QBPP in fourth quarter precipitated a bump in the channel's 2008 goal. That's the price of success, I suppose.

Speaking of success, Qwest also acknowledged its top performers at the event.

If you attended Q.Marketplace and have comments or photos, please e-mail me at khenderson@vpico.com.

--Khali