LAN Systems' former Nortel business manager, Mic Henderson, has taken on newly created sales role with communications integrator, Intelligent IP.

The two year-old, Perth-based company has developed a data communications solution which takes the disparate aspects of a network, including hosting, security, WAN/LAN management and VoIP, and pulls them into one centrally managed system. The company is a Cisco Premier partner.

Henderson is heading up Intelligent IP's Melbourne sales team. Intelligent IP has also brought on Gary O'Sullivan as Sydney-based sales manager. He was most recently with D-Link and has also worked with Lenovo and LAN Systems.

Both are tasked with building up its customer base. Its sweet spot was SMBs with 50-250 users.

"What's compelling about Intelligent IP is that it's a best practice solution around reducing costs while bringing together communications and security into one manage solution," Henderson said. "We're also offering Cisco leasing so there's no upfront costs for customers." Henderson said it was also keen to partner with other integrators.

"We are looking for partners who haven't specialised in communications and aren't prepared to fund and retain full-time engineers on-staff," he said. "They could specialise in applications development or services that we don't do as we're just focused on managing the communications side."

Henderson joined LAN Systems two-and-a-half years ago as a business development manager for its Westcon group (including Check Point, EMC and Nortel) in Perth. He relocated to Melbourne to head up its Nortel division last October.

However, the departure of Nick Avakian at Nortel and the appointment of Mark Fioretto in Sydney earlier this year meant the distributor needed a Sydney manager, Henderson said.

"I didn't think I'd go back into reseller land, as I had worked with Alphawest and other groups, but I met with Intelligent IP sales director, Jonathan Matthews, and was impressed," he said.

The company hoped to open a Brisbane office shortly and was looking at South Australia further down the track, Henderson said.