A California manufacturer of highly-specialized network management tools had been using a European distributor to introduce and maintain their presence in the European market.

After just a short while it became apparent the distributor wasn't up to the job. Expansion of new support and license contracts didn't happen, support for existing products didn't happen. Sales took a quick downward turn and within six months only 50% of original projections had been met.

One year later, we took over exclusive marketing in Europe. We were looking at negative returns and increasing competition. We quickly worked to form a team: product knowledge from the company side, market experience from our side.

The first order of business was to move the product away from being mass marketed to being niche marketed. Then we went to work building a network of distributors and resellers, and finding the partner needing our product. It only took two quarters to reach original projections.

Using our targeted approach, and despite intense competition from Cisco, Lucent, etc, we were able to help this company recover and break into their European market, bringing end-of-the-year sales figures to US$6 million.

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