Conner Smith, Trend Micro's head of partnerships and alliances for the Sub-Saharan Africa region.

Cyber security solutions vendor Trend Micro has appointed Conner Smith as its new head of Partnerships and Alliances for the Sub Saharan Africa region.

Smith joins the team effective 1 June, and will be responsible for leading the company's channel sales and alliance strategy across the continent.

Trend Micro says it has experienced excellent growth in its channel in the region over the last year, partly due to its focus and programmatic approach to delivering a reward- and certification-driven channel Programme that enables partners to fast track channel enablement and improve customer experience.

According to Indi Siriniwasa, VP Sub-Saharan Africa at Trend Micro, the company’s channel remains the primary means by which it engages with its customers across the region. “It is a critical part of our business, and we are delighted to welcome Conner. She is a proven Channel executive with a reputation for developing and nurturing key accounts and alliance partnerships, to the Trend Micro team.”

He says she brings an list of achievements to the role but also extensive knowledge of the channel outside of SA. “We believe she will assist us in taking our channel programme and partnerships to a new level."

Before joining Trend Micro, Smith was the Strategic Partner and Technology Alliance manager for Africa at Hitachi Vantara. She has more than eight years of experience with international vendors, and has an in-depth knowledge of the Sub-Saharan Africa region. In the past, she has held positions including technology channel manager, vendor management, strategic distribution manager, and sales manager and also spent time working at data specialists TIBCO and networking security company F5 Networks.

Smith says she is passionate about the IT industry, and has worked with global and pan-African telecommunications and financial services companies as well as had oversight of OEM accounts and alliances.

"Trend Micro is an exciting company and a leader in the security market. I am looking forward to bringing value to the team and its channel, by accelerating partner programmes, focussing on strategic alliances, and taking its specialised brand of holistic cloud security to a market craving innovation, but still constrained by security fears,” she concludes.