Celebrating thirty years of ARN

Knowledge, leadership, awareness and accepting change have always been key to thriving and surviving the Australian IT industry landscape. 

2025 marks thirty years of Australian Reseller News (ARN) in servicing our valuable channel community. Just as change has swept through the technology industry over the past three decades, change has also been a constant factor in the media space, and change is something that ARN has embraced throughout its publishing and community journey. 

Initially launching as Reseller in 1991, the magazine’s purpose was to provide business information, trends, insights and a connection point for the channel community as “The voice of the IT channel.”

In November 1995, IDG made the strategic decision to rebrand the magazine and Australian Reseller News (ARN) was launched under the innovative and fearless publisher, Suzie Searle.

The first of ARN edition hit the industry in February 1996 and the rest is set in channel history. 

“In a huge leap of faith thirty years ago, IDG launched Australian Reseller News (ARN) as a dedicated newspaper for the IT channel, the first in Australia. I was excited to be named its publisher,” Searle said. 

“I had been watching distribution companies like Dicker Data and Imagineering becoming prominent in the Australian market, and a new breed of smaller Australian owned resellers (then often called dealers) were bridging the sales gap between the big American multinationals and end customers. 

“Selling direct had been the major route to market, but a new level of the supply chain was emerging and creating a buzz. These resellers were a disparate group, competing with each other and at the mercy of the vendors who could sweep in and take back a deal which the reseller had negotiated. 

“They needed a voice to become a more powerful lobby, and they needed information specifically targeted to them.”

Industry legend David Henderson said hardware and software vendors ‘woke up’ and recognised that they were stronger with the channel. 

“The fad of going direct or giving the channel the crumbs was no longer acceptable. The market needed solutions, security and support, not a point product or technology,” Henderson said. 

Inaugural editor Paul Zucker (Vale) led the editorial charge in 1991 through to 1998 and over the next three decades he was followed by the literati of Phil Sim, Mark Jones, Gerard Norsa, Tamara Plakalo, Brian Corrigan, Nadia Cameron, Jennifer O’Brien, Mike Gee, Rimin Dutt, Allan Swann, Leon Spencer, James Henderson and finally yours truly, Julia Talevski.

“I’m privileged to have been a part of the ARN editorial team since 2005,” Talevski said. “I was fortunate to hone my craft under many experienced editorial hands particularly during the period of ‘saving’ a hot news lead for the magazine’s front page. We experienced online truly begin to champion print following our readership’s desire for digital content. 

“We also recognised the industry shift towards tailored and bespoke events, and the value of networking was drilled into me from very early on. Meeting everyone that crossed my path was vital and a massive differentiator.” 

Adopting the acronym ARN in 1997 was strategic from a branding perspective as the label ‘reseller’ didn’t fully reflect the broader partnership responsibility that went with the emerging role of trusted advisor. 

“Of course, there was technology content but it was shaped for the channel audience: what opportunities that technology created and how resellers could sell those products and create growth and profit by including that technology in their customer bundles,” Searle said. 

The terminology was different then too. Technology partners were known as hardware dealers, builders and resellers that predominantly sold products and add-ons like peripherals and off-the-shelf software. 

“What evolved as solutions were known as bundles and the more sophisticated bundles were known as value-add. The additions of services came later,” she said. 

ARN has always been an innovator, taking the thrilling first steps to online in early 1997, way ahead of the market. With the dawning of digital publishing, arnnet.com.au was born well before the excitement of the dotcom boom and bust. 

Y2K brought FUD: fear, uncertainty and doubt, but that was an exciting time for editorial – it always is!

“It was an essential time to be an online publisher with the need for immediacy of information, and as technology emerged from the IT department, into the broader organisation, and eventually becoming integral to daily life,” commented Searle.

“ARN continued to faithfully chronical the Australian channel landscape in print as well as digital, but as the power of ARN‘s online presence outgrew magazine circulation, the signs were telling and like many in the industry, we made the strategic decision to pivot our business model.

“But we never deviated from our purpose of creating essential information for the IT channel and fostering the channel community.”

IT industry stalwart Philip Cronin said the inimitable Susan Searle created a community.

ASI co-founder Maree Lowe said ARN has been a positive force in the industry, drawing attention to specific and relevant news, while representing the interests of all companies both local, regional and multinational. 

“It forms a knowledge bridge between local and global information and is a shortcut to industry news both business and product – in case you are just too busy,” Lowe said.  

“It reminds us all of the importance of partners. We all know Australians have the best technology in the best country.”

For Pip Marlow, Ken and Maree Lowe were her early career guardians, but she credited Searle as being a pivotal influencer. 

“What was being written about, who was being hired – she was across it all,” Marlow said. 

In the early 2000s, a new era of connecting the ARN audience with marketers dawned. Enter the world of events which offered face-to-face contact and influence.

ARN started with a series of editorially led roundtables with smaller carefully curated of partners and a vendor or distributor sponsor. But as the channel community grew and became a significant ecosystem, it was time for events to celebrate the companies in the industry and the individuals driving their success.

“In late 2006 ARN advertising manager, Jessica Ross, and I were at an IDG global event and started discussing doing awards as a way of celebrating the amazing work that companies and people were doing in the IT channel,” Searle said. 

The ARN Industry Awards started in 2007 with a sustainability theme, held at Doltone House at Jones Bay Wharf. The awards maxed out the 460-seating capacity one month in advance of the awards evening on 26 September 2007. From here on in, we recognised the power of the channel community and that we were on to something very special. 

“I can still remember the palpable excitement as we gathered in the beautiful room decorated with swirling lights and green ceiling decorations to the sound of the incredible taiko drums. The actual awards in that first year were bonsai trees. I wonder if anyone’s tree is still alive and thriving 18 years later?” Searle said. 

The first awards program included the naming of the IT Industry Hall of Fame and inaugural inductees were Jon Shein, Peter Kazacos and David Henderson. 

This has expanded to include many more enterprising individuals including Phil Cameron, John Walters, John Grant, Ross Cochrane, Philip Cronin, Maree and Ken Lowe, Steve Nola, Laurie Sellers, David Dicker, Wendy O’Keeffe, Moheb Moses, Craig Somerville, Pip Marlow, Nick Verykios, Andrew Thomas, Steve Murphy, Scott Frew, John Donovan, Kate Burleigh, David Gage, Allan King, Ian Poole, Dave Stevens, Craig Scroggie, Andrea Della Mattea, Susan Searle, Laurence Baynham, Dominic Whitehand, Angela Fox, Warren Nolan, Ronnie Altit, Ken Boal, Felix Wong, Alex Gambotto, Vlad Mitnovetski, Rhody Hill, Nathan Lowe, Fiona Brown, Bevan Slattery, Tara Ridley, Steve Martin, Leo Lynch and Norm Jefferies. 

As former founder of Kaz Group, Peter Kazacos emphasised ARN created a community for the industry to come together. 

“Although we competed in many areas it was great to see that we could also work together as we have done in forums that ARN hosted,” Kazacos said. 

“I have also recommended new organisations in the reseller community to enter award recognition opportunities. The ARN awards were one of the best because it was a recognition by your peers in the industry and this could then be leveraged with customers.”

In 2012, Women in ICT Awards (WIICTA) was launched to promote and celebrate females in the tech industry. At that time IT was dominated by men, particularly at the leadership level.

WIICTA provided a platform to the females in the industry and showed the importance of inclusiveness for organisational success and profitability. WIICTA has become a brand name which is synonymous with female significance, capability, and power and has been a catalyst for evolution in the tech landscape.

In 2025, WIICTA will extend its commitment to DEI with the launch of WIICTA Plus, a program to develop early female talent in the tech industry and provide mentorship and leadership pathways.

As events evolved, destination conferences became an opportunity to bring the Australian IT channel together and include the Reseller News audience cross the Tasman.

“Canalys was a global channel expo brand, but we found that the A/NZ audience wanted a conference with information and research targeted at the local markets, and that they wanted to network and collaborate with local contacts,” said Searle.

The first EDGE conference was held in 2015 in Port Douglas and started a decade long reputation as the must attend channel destination event.

The thought leadership through global and local speakers, plus curated and organic networking, make EDGE popular with marketers and tech solutions partners.

In 2025, EDGE content and format will be guided by an industry Brains Trust who specialise in knowing what partners need to transform and collaborate for today and the future against a background of growing customer demands with fast moving technologies and the cyber threat landscape. EDGE has evolved with the market to continue to be the channel’s one-stop A/NZ conference.

Throughout all this history, change, evolution, and disruption, there has been one constant. Over 30 years ARN has reported on, chronicled, educated, provided a voice for the IT channel in Australia. It has helped shape a powerful ecosystem whilst being its advocate.

To be continued….