Esprinet and Alkemy Together to Build a Full Service Provider Offering for Italian SMBs
Italian broadliner Esprinet has signed a partnership with Alkemy Play, the division dedicated to small and medium-sized enterprises of Alkemy, a company specialised in evolving the business model of large and medium-sized companies. The collaboration aims at providing digital services and solutions that will enable retailers to offer their customers the ability to create their own e-commerce marketplace.
Alkemy has been working since 2012 to improve processes and services of large and medium-sized companies, stimulating the evolution of their business model hand-in-hand with technological innovation. In 2017 it developed digital communication services addressed to SMEs through Alkemy Play, a division focused on marketing automation platforms for the delivery of digital services-such as, for example, opening an eShop channel or launching a local web campaign. By offering a fully Italian, scalable and flexible solution, it also enables SMEs to have access to the benefits of the digital world.
Alkemy Play's solution is part of Esprinet's vision to create new business opportunities by complementing its portfolio of products and solutions with a full range of services, supporting SMEs in their digitalization process, which has been accelerated by the pandemic but is now becoming systemic in companies' strategy. Esprinet created an internal division specifically dedicated to consulting and developing this offering, which is planned to be enriched in the near future with the addition of other innovative services.
The partnership, in line with the Esprinet Group's Business Plan, adds a further piece to move the company from its current distribution business model to that of a Full Service Provider serving the ecosystem of Vendors and Resellers. From 2024 onward, the Group will in fact have a dual line of business, value-added distribution on one hand and service to the IT ecosystem on the other, with different but at the same time synergistic sales volume and margin profiles.
“We are proud to have signed this partnership because we are aware of how strategic Digital Innovation is to keep our Country's competitive bar high", commented Alessandro Cattani, CEO of the Esprinet Group. “According to the index created by the European Commission (Digital Economy and Society Index) to measure and monitor the progress of European Countries in terms of digitalization of the economy and society, the level of digitalization of Italian SMEs is below the European average. The digitalization of a business also passes through its online visibility, and although 80% of SMEs claim to have their own website, very few have truly optimized, high-performance, mobile-responsive and constantly updated sites, so we hope with this operation to be able to be decisive in the process of digitizing the Country.”
“This collaboration is part of the broader mission that Alkemy has set since its founding: to contribute to the digitalization of the Country by accompanying our companies throughout the digital transformation journey”, added Duccio Vitali, CEO of Alkemy. “The partnership signed thus makes it possible to accelerate this process, guaranteeing our SMEs - which represent about 95% of the Italian economic fabric - new business opportunities, through the leverage of digital.”