Fortinet grows Australian channel team

Fortinet has hired three members for its ANZ channel team to support growth plans in Australia and New Zealand over the next 12 months.

New hires Brandon Blume, Ebony Williams and Merrilyn Gardiner are being brought in to "promote partner education enablement and lead the sales cycle with user clients."

Blume's past experience includes stints at Verizon Business, MCI WorldCom and Firewall Systems.

Williams has worked at F5, Bluecoat, Tipping Point and Sophos.

Gardiner was most recently mid-market channel manager for Check Point Software Technologies.

The trio are set to join the existing ANZ channel team along with channel manager Genevieve White and marketing and channel account manager Claire O'Brien.

They will be responsible for business development and growth within Fortinet's Gold, Silver and Bronze channels.

Vice president of South Pacific sales at Fortinet, Kevin Dyson, said: "This is an exciting time for Fortinet ANZ. We operate 100 percent through the channel and we work with our partners to target all market segments and verticals, including government, telecommunications and finance."

Fortinet, which is one of the world's largest network security appliances vendors, recently saw its revenues rise 15 percent to $615.3 million.