“You can’t go back to saying, ‘I remember life before ChatGPT and I’ll never use it again,’” says Cheryl Rang, vice president of technology solutions at Ingram Micro. “Now it’s about how you take that and build a business practice around it. A lot of partners are still getting comfortable, and that’s where we step in to train, enable and support them early in their AI journey.”
Ingram Micro is asking its partners to think critically about their AI strategies: are they using AI to build technology solutions or building technology solutions for AI?
That distinction, one executive said, will define how partners grow and remain competitive in the years ahead.
“No matter what AI becomes, the through line is how you’re applying it,” Cheryl Rang, vice president of technology solutions at Ingram Micro, told CRN. “Think of the modern workforce, your endpoint devices. Are you using AI PCs or are you using a PC to run an LLM? In networking, are you just putting AI tools in your firewall or are you using AI to build better fraud detection and stronger security protocols? It’s about how you apply it, not just where.”
The Irvine, Calif.-based distributor is helping partners navigate that question by focusing on enablement and services, as well as access to AI agents that can automate workflows, enhance customer experiences and create new revenue opportunities for MSPs.
[Related: Ingram Micro’s Sanjib Sahoo: AI Agents ‘Are Like Puppies’ That Must Be Trained]
Rang (pictured) said the company doesn’t expect partners to “build their own data center to train large language models,” but rather it’ll help partners apply AI to their business and deliver better outcomes for their customers.
That mindset shift is essential as AI moves from concept to necessity.
“You can’t go back to saying, ‘I remember life before ChatGPT and I’ll never use it again,’” she said. “Now it’s about how you take that and build a business practice around it. A lot of partners are still getting comfortable, and that’s where we step in to train, enable and support them early in their AI journey.”
She said partners are already finding practical use cases across industries, from manufacturing and retail to banking and healthcare. “We’re seeing it everywhere: fraud detection in banking, secure data management in healthcare and agent-based systems that make businesses run more efficiently.”
And the company is backing that transformation with its Xvantage platform, which now includes a built-in AI agent. The tool allows Ingram associates to have smarter, more valuable conversations with partners by automatically surfacing insights such as partner opportunities, recent company news or emerging solution areas.
“The AI agent helps associates go beyond transactional conversations,” she said. “Now they can say, ‘I’m walking into a customer meeting, show me their top opportunities.’ It pulls from multiple data sources and makes every interaction more meaningful.”
That same approach, she believes, will help partners adopt AI sooner rather than later, before the technology curve leaves them behind.
“When I think of how we can help partners be successful, today and in the future, it’s about making sure they always have the latest technology and the confidence to use it,” she said. “We want them to stay relevant, competitive and always one step ahead of the industry.”
