Touchbase's Maynard ships off to the US

Voice and data integrator Touchbase has waved goodbye to local managing director, Magnus Maynard, who is off to open a new office for the company in Boston in the United States.

He will be replaced by Andrew Fisher, the company's former Brisbane-based national market leader.

Maynard will be taking on a leadership role in the “heavily expanding” US market, said Fisher.

“He (Maynard) was meant to leave the position around six months ago but the move was put on hold because of Touchbase’s legal dispute with Avaya,” said Fisher.

“We thought it would be better to show a united front during this time and keep things going as they were”.

The Avaya dispute was a “difficult time” said Fisher, because he had worked at the networking vendor between 2001 and 2002.

“During the time, I knew Touchbase was doing the right thing and my loyalties were never questioned,” he said.

Fisher said Touchbase didn't view telecommunications carriers as competition anymore. “We are competing with consultancies like Accenture.

“Carriers are in the business of selling units and organisations want more 'consultancy-type' services," he said.

“These guys don’t want to hear about buttons and functions on a phone, [rather] they want to know the ROI on their communication products.”

Fisher has spent 14 years in the IT&T sector, having started out as an AAPT door-to-door salesman in the late 1980s.

Fisher was also head of sales for Telstra in Europe between 1998 and 2000.

“I was based in Europe and the experience was amazing”. The sheer magnitude of the marketplace and the people was just superb,” said Fisher.