Instant messenging security vendor makes third distribution partnership attempt in the past 18-months

Instant messenging (IM) security vendor Facetime has appointed Wick Hill as its sole UK distributor, its third distribution partnership attempt in the past 18-months.

The vendor specialises in software for the management and control of ‘greynet’ applications such as IM, webmail, peer-to-peer file sharing, web conferencing and instant voice. The firm initially partnered with e92plus to drive up its UK market share.

However, that relationship ended last summer (CRN, 31 May 2005) and the firm signed with Unipalm, now Computerlinks.

A Facetime representative told CRN that the relationship fizzled out in November.

“We needed a value-added distributor to work with us, one that was good at bringing new products to the market and that would prove a good revenue source for us,” the representative said. “Computerlinks was used to dealing with much bigger vendors than us and a firm such as Wick Hill was more appropriate.”

Ian Kilpatrick, managing director of Wick Hill Group, said: “I am not in a position to comment on Facetime’s reasons for parting company with other distributors. I do know that they signed with us for our proven market entry skills as a VAD [Value Added Distributor] in the security sector.”

Kilpatrick added that Wick Hill will be focusing on recruiting resellers for Facetime, particularly those with customers of 100-plus users up to Times 100 companies.

Mukesh Gupta, managing director of e92plus, said: “Facetime has been going from distributor to distributor. The IM market is still in its infancy and a lot of other vendors such as Barracuda and SurfControl have this technology in their existing products which customers can switch on or off.

“Facetime has a good product, but I’m not convinced about its market space.”