COLUMBIA, S.C., Feb. 18, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Unitrends, the leading provider of all-in-one backup, archiving, instant recovery and disaster recovery solutions, today announced that Bob Gagnon, the company's vice president of channel sales, has been named one of UBM Tech Channel's CRN 2013 Channel Chiefs. This is Gagnon's third CRN Channel Chief recognition. The prestigious list of the most influential and powerful leaders in the IT channel recognizes those executives directly responsible for driving channel sales and growth within their organization, while evangelizing and defending the importance of the channel throughout the entire IT industry.

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Click to Tweet: Congrats to @Unitrends_Inc's Bob Gagnon for being recognized as a #CRN 2013 Channel Chief http://bit.ly/Z2uvDC

Gagnon joined Unitrends in early 2012, tasked with expanding the company's channel program through increased sales and a robust network of partners. Under his leadership, the channel program saw record growth last year. Highlights include:

• 104 percent growth in channel sales, 2012 over 2011.
• 198 percent growth in new value-added reseller (VAR) accounts, 2012 over 2011, with 200 net new accounts signed. Unitrends' partner ecosystem now consists of more than 500 organizations worldwide.
• 100 percent growth in channel staff within Unitrends, 2012 over 2011, and 154 percent growth in the number of channel representatives supporting the company.

Gagnon also played an important role in developing and launching UniRewards, Unitrends' new loyalty program for channel partners and resellers designed to incentivize every step of the sales process. Piloted with select partners since October 2012 and expanded to Unitrends' full partner ecosystem earlier this month, UniRewards enables members to earn points for engaging in various activities that support the company's products and services, such as inviting other sales reps to join the program, registering a qualified lead and closing a deal. Members can then redeem their reward points for cash and other incentives on the UniRewards portal.  The UniRewards platform also grants channel members access to sales and pre-sales training, as well as marketing toolkits and co-branded collateral that support their outreach efforts.

"The success of our channel program over the past year is primarily due to Unitrends' commitment to three important principles: Make it easy for partners to do business with us, deliver simple, affordable and best-in-class data protection solutions for heterogeneous environments and offer our partners the same high levels of support and service that our end users have grown accustomed to," commented Gagnon. "We strive to deliver unrivaled value that helps our partners grow their business. We view this honor by CRN as validation that the work we are doing is having its desired impact." 

For over 10 years, Channel Chiefs have been selected by the CRN editorial team based on channel experience, program innovations, channel-driven revenue and public support for the importance of IT channel sales. 

"The 2013 Channel Chiefs list recognizes vendor executives dedicated to driving channel programs in the IT marketplace," said Kelley Damore, senior vice president and editorial director at CRN. "Our annual Channel Chiefs issue is a must-read for IT solution providers evaluating new vendors or looking to expand solution offerings. These are the people, the products and the programs that any savvy solution provider needs to know. We congratulate this year's Channel Chiefs for their stellar record of business innovation and applaud them for their continued dedication to the partner community."

Selected by CRN's editorial staff, the 2013 Channel Chiefs list is featured in the Feb. 18, 2013 issue of CRN Magazine and will be featured online at www.crn.com.

About Unitrends
The trusted provider of all-in-one backup solutions, Unitrends enables its customers to focus on their business instead of backup. The company's family of scalable, all-in-one appliances and software solutions for backup, archiving, instant recovery and disaster recovery protects corporate data, over 100 different versions of servers, operating systems (including Windows, Hyper-V, VMware, Mac OS, Linux, AIX, Solaris and many others), SAN, NAS, hypervisors (including Hyper-V and VMware) and applications (including Exchange, SQL, Oracle and many others).  Unitrends is the preferred choice of IT professionals because the company sets the standard in virtual, physical and cloud server data protection with instant recovery that enables complete system recovery in less than five minutes while Unitrends' pricing offers the lowest TCO in the industry. Unitrends' U.S.-based support team boasts a 99% customer satisfaction rate. Visit www.unitrends.com.    

About UBM Tech Channel (www.ubmchannel.com)
UBM Tech Channel, a UBM company, is the premier provider of IT channel-focused events, media, research, consulting, and sales and marketing services. With over 30 years of experience and engagement, UBM Tech Channel has the unmatched channel expertise to execute integrated solutions for technology executives managing partner recruitment, enablement and go-to-market strategy in order to accelerate technology sales. To learn more about UBM Tech Channel, visit us at: www.ubmchannel.com. 

UBM llc (www.ubm.com)
UBM llc is a leading global business media company. We inform markets and bring the world's buyers and sellers together at events, online, in print and provide them with the information they need to do business successfully. We focus on serving professional commercial communities, from doctors to game developers, from journalists to jewelry traders, from farmers to pharmacists around the world. Our 6,000 staff in more than 30 countries is organized into specialist teams that serve these communities, helping them to do business and their markets to work effectively and efficiently. For more information, go to www.ubm.com.

Media Contacts:
Jackie Gerbus for Unitrends, Inc.
pr@unitrends.com
803-454-0300

Cynthia Cooper  for UBM Tech Channel   
Cynthia.cooper@ubm.com
508-416-1186                               

SOURCE Unitrends