Khali Henderson Blog: PHONE+ Adds to Channel Team

The team responsible for PHONE+ and the Channel Partners Conference & Expo have been working to help the communications channel community to capitalize on the opportunities presented by the collision of the IT and telecom channels. This is a very exciting challenge for all of us.

To embolden our efforts, we added accomplished industry publishing leaders to our team in July. Larry Lannon joins the Telecom Division as group publisher overseeing both the channel and service provider segments of the business. He has more than 20 years of experience in event, digital and print media. You might remember Larry from his tenure at Telephony as the group vice president and publisher. Most recently, he was the president of Ascend Media’s Allied Division. 

Mike Saxby, who had been our group publisher for the past five years, will remain actively involved in both the magazine and the trade show and will serve as an adviser on the PHONE+/Channel Partners Conference & Expo Advisory Board.

In addition, Susan Pienkos-Kostbar joins the company as senior account executive. She most recently was channel sales manager for Channel Insider, managing sales of Ziff Davis Enterprise's channel portfolio as proprietor of her independent organization, Arancione Group LLC. She also spent 14 years in sales management for Everything Channel division of United Business Media, which includes CRN, ChannelWEB, VAR Business and XChange events.

I hope that you will have the chance to meet them at the upcoming Channel Partners Conference & Expo, Sept. 20-22, in Washington D.C.  I am confident you will find them both engaging and experienced — just the kinds of folks you want leading your industry magazine.

Of course, I will remain as the editor in chief and am looking forward to working with Larry, Mike, Susan and, most importantly, you toward a successful future for the communications channel.

You can find us all listed with our contact info in the PHONE+ masthead and on this website's contact page. I encourage you to reach out to any one of us with your thoughts and feedback on how we can help you with information and education that will drive your company's profitable transformation into a next-generation partner.

I look forward to hearing from you.