Two of the industry’s largest and most well-known alliances have joined forces. U.K.-based AVM Impact has agreed to merge its AV Global Alliance program with the Global Presence Alliance, which includes founding partner Whitlock.

The partnership is expected to “further strengthen the GPA’s position as the world’s leading alliance of audiovisual, videoconferencing and unified communications solutions and managed services providers,” according to a press release announcing the move.

AVM Impact, the new company created through the recent merger of AVM and Impact, had been successful in building an alliance network of A/V partners over recent years. Their recent acquisition of Impact, a founding partner of the GPA in Europe the Middle East and Asia (EMEA), created the opportunity the opportunity for the two alliances to become one.

With the merger, the GPA will welcome qualified partners in several new and larger geographic locations, which will “generate more opportunities for customers to realize the benefits of enterprise standards, consistent quality and global support,” according to the press release.

The move brings together partners in more than 70 locations across five continents covering every time zone. With more than 50 international companies already utilizing services from these organizations, “the intent is to raise much greater market awareness of the benefits of global collaboration through more concentrated marketing and customer case studies,” according to the partners.

“We are truly delighted to merge the AV Global Alliance within the GPA,” says Ed Cook, CEO of AVM Impact. “It is our aim to use this combined scale to develop ever more sophisticated engagement models and standards based solutions to meet the needs of our global customers.”

“I am very excited about the prospect of delivering a whole new level of service, which includes further improved global capabilities for our enterprise customers and partners,” he says.

Whitlock VP Julian Phillips agrees with Cook.

“The GPA and the AV Global Alliance have both been successful in raising market awareness and providing innovative global solutions,” he says. “Bringing the programs together makes it easier for customers and technology providers to select the most capable partner to help drive enterprise standards and global services.”

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D. Craig MacCormack

Craig MacCormack is a veteran journalist with more than 15 years experience covering local and national news and sports as well as architecture and engineering. He joined Commercial Integrator in January 2011. Follow him on Twitter: @CraigMacCormack.

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