As part of CRN’s Top 100 Executives Of 2026 list, we highlight 25 sales executives leading the channel charge.
For CRN’s Top 25 Channel Sales Leaders of 2026, we’ve spotlighted executives at channel-focused technology vendors who are empowering partners to expand their businesses across high-growth markets, including AI, security, networking, infrastructure, software, data management and cloud services.
As vendors accelerate investments in AI and other transformative technologies, these channel leaders are evolving partner programs and introducing new resources designed to enable, train, certify and reward solution providers. Their efforts are helping partners build new practices, deliver greater customer value and increase profitability in an increasingly competitive market.
Our number 1 channel sales leader, Lenovo’s Wade McFarland, is driving growth in his company’s data center, infrastructure and services businesses as part of the “One Lenovo” integrated business strategy aligning device.
What follows is CRN’s list of the Top 25 Channel Sales Leaders of 2026, part of CRN’s Top 100 Executives of 2026.
25. Brian Moats
SVP, Global Commercial Sales, Partners
Broadcom
Moats hit the ground running since becoming Broadcom’s channel chief in early 2025, shifting its professional services business to channel partners, who are now providing nearly all implementation services for VMware by Broadcom solutions. He is now incentivizing partners to drive VMware Cloud Foundation to provide AI, on-premises and private cloud solutions for customers.
24. Michelle Welch
CMO, SVP, Business Strategy
WatchGuard Technologies
Welch has helped to oversee the expansion of channel-focused product offerings as well as enhanced partner enablement at WatchGuard Technologies. Key moves have included providing several dedicated teams, including technical account managers and deployment teams, to ensure ongoing support to partners beyond just offering presales training, according to Welch.
23. Anthony Torsiello
SVP, Worldwide Partners Alliances
Zscaler
Through channel efforts led by Torsiello, Zscaler is putting partners at the center of its massive push around AI security and enablement. This has included an increasing reliance on channel partners for driving new growth and delivering services around the cybersecurity giant’s expanding zero-trust security platform, according to Torsiello.
22. Tom Evans
Chief Partner Officer
Cloudflare
Evans recently spearheaded a major channel initiative at Cloudflare targeted at working closely with partners around fast-growing opportunities, such as enabling secure AI adoption and SASE deployments. The Cloudflare One Design Partner Designation aims to provide key partners with a deeper level of technical expertise and enablement, according to Evans.
21. Michael Gray
SVP, Global Channels, Alliances
Qlik
Gray calls the channel a “strategic growth engine” for Qlik. While he says the Qlik Partner Program is “rock solid,” his goal is to boost the program’s enablement and incentive offerings and improve its simplicity and predictability. Gray describes himself as a big believer in the “power of three”: Qlik, its technology and hyperscaler partners, and the company’s solution provider go-to-market partners to develop and co-sell comprehensive AI-powered solutions.
20. Bryce Grow
SVP, Global Channels
SentinelOne
As SentinelOne continues to expand its offerings in fast-growing areas such as security operations and AI security, Grow has overseen the vendor’s partner strategy and execution initiatives. Top priorities have included expanding SentinelOne’s reach in the channel and boosting growth with partners in key security segments.
19. Scott Barlow
Chief Evangelist, Global Head Of Community
Sophos
Barlow has overseen the major MSP push at Sophos that has brought a strong focus on helping partners to increase revenue around offerings such as MDR while lowering costs. Other recent initiatives include deeper integrations with third-party tools and the launch of a virtual CISO offering.
18. Kevin Kennedy
VP, Global Ecosystem
Red Hat
In his first year as Red Hat channel chief, Kennedy takes the reins at a pivotal moment, helping partners of the IBM subsidiary leverage open-source innovation, hybrid cloud modernization and AI-ready infrastructure to make the agentic era a reality while capitalizing on the VMware exodus opportunity.
17. Kobi Elbaz
SVP, GM, Global Revenue Operations
HP Inc.
Elbaz in 2023 led a reorganization of HP Inc. that gave the PC and print giant a single organization covering global channels, sales and operations, and has since followed up with significant new channel partner education, support and stackable incentives through its HP Amplify program to drive improved engagement.
16. Dave Guzzi
Global Channel Chief
Intel
Guzzi’s role as global channel chief puts him at the center of Intel’s strategy for bringing enterprise AI, CPU and accelerator technologies to the company’s diverse channel partner community. He has been instrumental in communicating with channel partners about how Intel is meeting growing CPU demand in the face of component shortages.
15. Steven Loeb
VP, Marketing, Global Distributed IT, Global Data Center Segment
Eaton
The 20-year channel veteran has been the driving force behind an all-out charge to propel partners into the lucrative AI power and cooling market. Loeb’s razor-sharp channel focus has been key to the success of the Eaton “white space” team, which was formed to tackle the AI-driven data center opportunity.
14. Kristine Wedum
VP, U.S. Partner Organization
NetApp
In her role as channel chief for NetApp’s Americas business, Wedum leads NetApp’s U.S. channel strategy and drives partner-led growth for a company that depends on indirect sales for about three-quarters of its overall revenue. This includes aligning partners with the company’s AI and intelligent data infrastructure strategies.
13. Tim Coogan
SVP, Global Partner Sales
Cisco Systems
Coogan is a busy man as he orchestrates relationships with the channel partners that account for nearly 90 percent of Cisco’s nearly $66 billion in annual revenue. He does so by working with over 40,000 channel partners across 165 countries serving small businesses to Fortune 500 enterprises.
12. Chris Bell
SVP, Global Channels, Alliances, Corporate Development
Sophos
In a move spearheaded by Bell, Sophos unveiled a refreshed channel program featuring an array of updates aimed at better rewarding partners and enhancing flexibility. The new program includes expanded incentives and improved training while also unifying the formerly separate Sophos and Secureworks programs, according to Bell.
11. Michael Khoury
VP, Ecosystem Partners
Palo Alto Networks
Khoury recently oversaw a revamp of Palo Alto Networks’ NextWave Partner Program, with major updates introduced that aim to massively boost profitability and training for the channel. The launch of expanded incentives and enablement, including new AI-powered training, are part of a bid to deepen the company’s work with partners, according to Khoury.
10. Kareem Yusuf
SVP, Ecosystem, Strategic Partners, Initiatives
IBM
A year and a half into his time as channel chief, Yusuf shapes the vendor’s next chapter of ecosystem growth by aligning partners around AI, automation, hybrid cloud and other Big Blue opportunities. With a civil engineering doctorate and product expertise, he brings a technologist’s vision to the role, aiding partners in accelerating their capabilities.
9. Daniel Bernard
Chief Business Officer
CrowdStrike
Bernard has helped to steer CrowdStrike’s accelerated channel efforts including through greater reliance on partners for service delivery around security operations. Meanwhile, with Project QuiltWorks, CrowdStrike has collaborated with channel partners to help prepare customers for a flood of AI-discovered software vulnerabilities, according to Bernard.
8. Christian Goffi
VP, Americas Ecosystem Sales
Nutanix
Goffi leads the strategy and execution of Nutanix’s partner-led go-to-market across the Americas, which was critical to the company recently reporting a record $2.43 billion in annual recurring revenue. He is leading partner enablement around AI strategy and selling AI solutions, while also focusing on a small number of elite partners to drive big Nutanix wins.
7. Gordon Lord
VP, Channels, North America
Schneider Electric
Lord, one of the most respected and accomplished channel leaders in the business, has opened up the highly lucrative AI power and cooling market to partners. Partners say that by putting the focus on software assessments, Lord and team have unlocked a wave of new customer engagements. Look for more game-changing offerings as Schneider Electric helps partners power up the enterprise AI agent and inferencing boom.
6. Simon Ewington
SVP, Channel, Partner Ecosystem
HPE
Ewington has the HPE channel firing on all cylinders with a profit-packed Partner Ready Vantage program that is driving more partners to make bigger bets on HPE with expanded channel-only routes to market. At the same time, he has simplified partner engagement throughout the business.
5. Craig Weinstein
VP, Americas Partner Organization
Nvidia
Weinstein has put in place a channel and ecosystem buildout that is winning praise from partners as one of the most advanced and effective go-to-market sales motions in the business. The 10-year Nvidia veteran is now taking the partner offensive to new heights with a focus on revolutionizing enterprise tokenomics with the Vera CPU and the Groq 3 LPX server rack.
4. Nicole Dezen
Chief Partner Officer, Corporate VP, Global Partner Solutions
Microsoft
Dezen champions one of the world’s largest, most influential partner ecosystems with AI-focused incentives, training programs, marketplace incentives and go-to-market investments that raise the bar for solution provider enablement and specialization.
3. Ruba Borno
VP, Worldwide Channels, Alliances
Amazon Web Services
AWS channel chief Borno has led the explosion of the AWS Marketplace, modernized the Partner Central Platform with agentic AI capabilities and launched the new partner-led AWS Forward Deployed Engineering organization this year. She also spearheaded efforts to launch a new Partner Greenfield Program, revamp the AWS Partner Central hub via Amazon Bedrock AgentCore, and pay partners direct cash benefits for delivering business outcomes.
2. Denise Millard
Chief Partner Officer
Dell Technologies
The 28-year Dell veteran’s bold channel leadership has helped put the company into the AI fast lane. Under Millard’s leadership, Dell has continued to drive higher levels of partner profitability. If that isn’t enough, she is transforming the partner experience with the power of AI through fully automated deal registration and dynamic pricing.
1. Wade McFarland
VP, Channels, North America
Lenovo
Lenovo is on a tear. The company in May reported record fiscal year 2025/26 revenue of $83.1 billion, with year-over-year growth of 42 percent attributed in large part to its hybrid AI business. A lot of credit for that growth goes to McFarland, who in the year or so since joining Lenovo has led North American sales for a company that depends on channel partners and distribution for growth. His 23 years of experience at Dell Technologies prepared him to drive growth in Lenovo’s data center, infrastructure and services businesses as part of the “One Lenovo” integrated business strategy aligning device, infrastructure and services business units to simplify its go-to-market approach for partners and customers.
