Emiliano Faccioli, Regional Sales Manager di Crestron in Italia<\/p><\/div>\n

The Italian point of view
\n<\/strong>Finally, we heard from Emiliano Faccioli<\/strong>, who explained how the work with Maverick in Italy was set up, and what results are expected from the new collaboration.<\/p>\n

Connessioni- How was the European agreement with Maverick “dropped” into the Italian reality?
\n<\/strong>EF –<\/strong> The IT sector to which the UC solutions are addressed is used to exploit the IT distribution channels, where Maverick is already active and where it was important for us to increase our presence. The traditional channel remains active, so Maverick becomes an additional channel that allows us to reach new customers in IT, but our way of working doesn\u2019t change.<\/p>\n

C – How do you carry out your daily work?
\n<\/strong>EF –<\/strong> The agreement is from July so we are still at the beginning, also considering that August is a less active month; we have however had some meetings, and started to align ourselves to be ready for September.<\/p>\n

C – Do you think Maverick’s new channel will be useful in Italy?
\n<\/strong>EF –<\/strong> Certainly, working with a distributor in the IT sector is an obligatory step: when you talk to this world you realise that language, points of view, needs are different, it is a large market that requires you to adapt to what I would call it\u2019s “habits and customs.\u201d However, Covid has paved the way for video communication solutions in the IT world as well, making them become not just an accessory but a tool for everyday work. The two worlds of IT and AV have come very close, but the last mile is up to us.<\/p>\n

C – Apart from the collaboration with Maverick, is it difficult to overcome the “last mile”?
\nEF –<\/strong> Crestron is a historical player in System Integration, and the process to move to software solutions started years ago, so the ICT language is already familiar to us and we have an advantage. The concepts of scalability and redundancy are familiar to us, but it is not so throughout the AV world; we still have to work to communicate the difference between professional and consumer, the consequent difference in the distribution channel and, obviously, in costs. You can’t make an auditorium out of a soundbar, and it’s useful for an IT manager to learn to be wary of those who say otherwise: our mission is to make them understand that there are AV issues they don’t know about but need to consider.<\/p>\n