The latest senior recruit at Dimension Data's Oakton business can "speak the language of the CIO" – because he spent the past five years as a major IT buyer.
Former Bauer Media CIO Simon Wheeler has been appointed as Oakton's director of service integration.
Wheeler became Bauer's first CIO after the German publishing giant acquired the magazine business – whose titles include The Australian Women's Weekly, Harper's Bazaar and TV Week – from Nine Entertainment in 2012.
In 2014, Wheeler chose Enablis to roll out Bauer's new Australian network after seperating from Nine Entertainment.
He was replaced by Bauer's head of transformation Stephen Haddad after leaving in March this year.
In his new role at Oakton, Wheeler will be responsible for strategic engagements, developing new and existing partnership and meeting and coordinating IT assignments.
“Oakton works in a lot of different verticals with a wide range of clients, so there’s the opportunity to learn those industries,” Wheeler told CRN.
While he has worked with buyers like Bauer and Nine for the past five years, his early career was spent in technical support and consultancy roles in the UK. Wheeler said he’s keen to bring his CIO skills back to the supply side of the fence.
“Obviously there’ll be a lot of engagement with CIOs and clients. In a CIO role, you’re consulting within your own business so you are your own internal sales. But I can take that set of skills into a consulting company, I speak the language of the CIO.”
Bauer operates more than 80 online and print publications in Australia, including Top Gear Australia, Wheels, Cleo and Empire.
Oakton was acquired by Dimension Data last year for $171 million.
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