Top East Coast Video VAR Gets New CEO, President

Effective immediately, Ronald Gaboury will become CEO following 12 years at the VAR as president and COO, replacing CEO York Wang. Into the president and COO office steps David Phillips, who will run York Telecom's day-to-day business and be responsible for executing its strategic plan.

York Telecom confirmed the moves in a statement Tuesday. Wang, who founded the company in 1985, will remain chairman of York Telecom's board and also its majority shareholder. According to York Telecom, he will continue to consult on strategic products and services.

"We are continuing to transform ourselves as a high growth company that will become more relevant as a trusted partner to our customers and meet the evolving needs of organizations wanting to use collaboration as a strategic asset," Wang said in a statement.

Gaboury first joined York Telecom in 1995 and was chief financial officer until 1999, when he was named president and COO. According to York Telecom, he led Phillips' recruitment.

Phillips is a 30-year IT veteran. He spent two and a half years as senior vice president, worldwide sales at Polycom, overseeing $500 million in revenue growth there before departing Polycom in February 2009.

Before his Polycom tenure, Phillips was COO of ACS Dataline, a networking VAR, and before that was senior vice president and general manager at enterprise software provider Trilogy. He also held executive roles at AT&T, Lucent, Avaya and other companies. Following his departure from Polycom, Phillips founded and ran a sales, strategy and technology consultancy, Phillips Holdings, and offered analyst comment on big consolidation moves happening in the video space.

Phillips cited York as "the leading independent company in the fast-growing videoconferencing market" and said the VAR was uniquely positioned to capture greater market share.

"With its strong heritage in government markets and its proven ability to acquire marquee commercial customers, together with an excellent reputation gained through the efforts of its talented people and the availability of capital, we have a solid foundation from which to grow," said Phillips in a statement.

York Telecom's offerings run the gamut from managed services and videoconferencing to bundled telepresence, digital signage, maintenance and integration services, VNOC hosted video, UC, streaming and a focus on the government and public sector markets. Its line card includes substantial Cisco-Tandberg and Polycom practices, as well as LifeSize, Vidyo and other video specialists.

Enterprise video conferencing and telepresence continue to be a hot market for solution providers -- one that, according to Infonetics Research, grew 18 percent in 2010 and is expected to be a $5 billion market by 2015. Video market experts and channel observers see continued consolidation in the space, as well as increasing opportunities for VARs as video takes a more prominent role in unified communications solutions.