du bags Cisco's global 'Innovation Award'

Being the best in its region, Tecom Telecom, which was bought by du early this year and which will operate integrated telecommunication operations under the du brand, was one of the eight global honorees selected from a list of more than 2,800 Cisco Certified Channel Partners worldwide for their outstanding performance in 2005.

During his visit to the Middle East, John Chambers, President and CEO of Cisco Systems handed the award to Ahmed Bin Byat, Chairman of du.

'This honor emphasizes the important role du's relationship with Cisco plays in delivering the next-generation products and services our customers require,' commented Bin Byat. 'Moving forward, we will continue to build upon our partnership with Cisco by strengthening our go-to-market engagement in the field and developing new and innovative programs around our Cisco-based services.'

'As our customer's needs evolve, the market transitions and the network becomes the platform for communications; there has never been a better time to be a Cisco partner,' said Mark De Simone, Vice President for Cisco's operations in the Middle East and Africa. 'It pleases me to say that we have world class channel partners. At our annual Cisco Partner Summit I had the honor and the privilege of recognizing our top global performers for 2005.'

'The innovation award was based on several factors, such as creating scalable best practices and the delivery of new creative services to the market that differentiate both Cisco and the partner. The other factor was based on building a partnership with Cisco that is in tandem with Cisco's overall channel strategy,'

added Samer Alkharrat, General Manager, Cisco Systems, Gulf Region.

The Cisco Global Awards are conferred to partners who meet a specific set of requirements, which are designed to identify the best channel partner in each category. Cisco has also built a formalized nomination and selection process that begins with each sales theater identifying and nominating a channel partner for each category. These nominations are reviewed and a collective group that includes Cisco worldwide channels and theater channel executives makes final selections. All of the global and theater Partner of the Year awards are in compliance with the requirements of the Cisco Channel Partner Program and customer satisfaction as its foundational criterion.