Benchmark Corp., an IT solutions provider known for redesigning and optimizing the data centre, announces the appointment of Luc Villeneuve, a 30-year veteran in the channel, as its new president.

“Luc’s leadership, business acumen, and passion for our ecosystem are exactly what we need to scale our offering nationally and leverage burgeoning opportunities in the market,” says Kam Sabouri, Benchmark owner.  “He’ll be my right-hand delivering our expertise and customized solutions to commercial and enterprise companies.

“I’m proud our team has driven incredible growth turning Benchmark into an innovative company that delivers the same quality as its larger competitors, at a fraction of the cost.  Over the past six years that I’ve been leading sales, we’ve earned the trust and respect of our clients with our customer-first culture at Benchmark. We listen to our customers and deliver solutions that position them for their future needs. It’s time to scale our model to the next level by continuing to collaborate with our exceptional vendor partners and customers, to create the best solutions for their business.  Together Luc and I are confident we can grow Benchmark into a $250 million leader in the next three years by expanding our successful team.”

Most recently Villeneuve served as Canada country leader and general manager for Red Hat Canada, where his team tripled bookings in the past five years and was honoured as Red Hat’s North American FY18 Region of the Year.  Before joining Red Hat, Villeneuve served as president of NCR Canada, where he turned around a floundering business by reinvigorating relationships with top clients and renewing the trusted partner model.  In the first year, he led the team to a 30-per cent increase in revenue during the global economic downturn.  He was promoted to president, NCR Europe, where he combated declining market-share with a radical leadership shakeup that bolstered the 5,000-person European operations, generating $1.5 billion and returning the region to profit in each quarter.  He received the prestigious Chairman’s Award.

“My strength is attracting and inspiring the right talent to create a winning team to collaborate with vendor partners and make doing business seamless, rewarding and fun. It is NOT our intention to build a fulfilment re-seller model,” explains Villeneuve. “We are building a team of sales and delivery professionals with exceptional customer relationships, who provide value by solving critical business challenges with our vendor community. I am passionate about attracting a truly diverse, vendor-friendly team who loves what they do. This reflects our open and supportive culture at Benchmark, where we want to help everyone reach their potential.”