Sharp Earns Business Technology Association’s Top 2015 Channel’s Choice Award

Five vendors among award winners

Kansas City, MO, May 8, 2015 Sharp Imaging and Information Company of America was recently presented with the 2015 Channel’s Choice Superior Performance Award by the Business Technology Association (BTA; www.bta.org). Pete Salmon, vice president of Western Region Sales for Sharp, accepted the coveted award on behalf of Sharp on May 7 from 2014-15 BTA President Ron Hulett at BTA’s Cruise to Success event, hosted by BTA Mid-America at the Radisson Blu Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota. In addition, Sharp received Channel’s Choice awards in the Distribution and Product Line performance categories. The company was also among the winners in a three-way tie for the Channel Choice Award in the Corporate Support performance category.

Two other manufacturers were also presented with 2015 Channel’s Choice awards. KYOCERA Document Solutions America received the award for its Outstanding Performance as a Secondary Product Line Provider. The company also received an award in the three-way tie in the Corporate Support performance category. Tom Walsh, vice president of the Western Division for Kyocera, accepted the awards.

Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A. Inc. received the award in the Inventory performance category as well as an award in the three-way tie in the Corporate Support performance category. Rick Taylor, president and CEO for Konica Minolta and the keynote presenter at the Cruise to Success event, accepted the awards.

BTA also presented 2015 Channel’s Choice awards in two other categories. MSE received the award in the Remanufactured Cartridges category. Paolo Galvez, a key account manager at MSE, accepted the award. GreatAmerica Financial Services received the award in the Third-Party Leasing category. Josie Heskje, director of Strategic Marketing for the Office Equipment Group at GreatAmerica, accepted the award.

Earlier this year, BTA emailed a link to the online ballot to all of its dealer members and a number of dealers outside of its membership. The association also encouraged industry vendors to provide the ballot link to dealers. The ballot asked dealers to rate their primary- and secondary-line hardware vendors in key performance categories, as well as to rate vendors in the two additional award categories — remanufactured cartridges and third-party leasing. The balloting results determined the Channel’s Choice award winners. BTA received 343 completed ballots.

“BTA’s annual Channel’s Choice awards program, which began in 1989, provides dealers with a means of recognizing and honoring those vendors that are the most supportive of the dealer channel,” Hulett said. “Through the years, we have honored a number of deserving vendors for their outstanding product lines, exceptional levels of performance and dealer support. As our 2015 Channel’s Choice winners, we congratulate GreatAmerica, Konica Minolta, Kyocera, MSE and Sharp, and express our sincere thanks for their exceptional support of the BTA Channel.”

A summary of balloting results will be made available to BTA members. The summary, currently being prepared by Industry Analysts Inc., based in Rochester, N.Y., will provide a view of how dealers rate their vendor partners. When completed, the summary will be available for download to BTA members at www.bta.org/ChannelsChoice (a username and password is required to download the summary).