Judging an association is not an easy task. But, when a premier research agency like IDC (India) is given the task of evaluating top channel bodies in
the country, the task becomes a lot more measurable and bona fide. Besides, IDC (India) is the only research organization to have received the ISO 9001:2000 certification from Det Norske Veritas AS (DNV) recently.

For the second consecutive year DQ Channels commissioned IDC India with the task of ranking the 28 active IT channel associations in the country on various parameters. After taking comprehensive feedback from committees and randomly picked members, the results were evaluated to arrive at the ranking.

The ranking reflects the activities and efforts put in by each association for the year 2005. Surprisingly, this year's results were in no ways similar to that of the previous year. Except for the Trichy-based Association of Computer Traders (ACTT) staying steady at number 20, every other association got a different ranking.

The survey saw many ups and downs with some of the popular associations falling down to lower rank as compared to its previous year's ranking. Here is the much-anticipated result of the second DQC-IDC Channel Association Survey - 2006.  

TAIT tops the charts
Mumbai's premier trade body for the IT channel community - Traders Association of Information Technology (TAIT) - topped the DQC-IDC Channel Association Survey - 2006. According to the member feedback and the analyst evaluation, TAIT has been very effective in resolving member issues and conducting member welfare programs. Being an association that represents the channel partners' in the commercial city of the country, it has put in a lot of efforts in extending quality support to both its members and non-members whenever it was required. Many a times, the association has gone out of its way in voicing the community's concerns with the local as well as central government through trade representations. It has been continuously trying to address issues relating to VAT and octroi, which has always been a concern for channel partners in Mumbai.

OVERALL RANKING OF ASSOCIATIONS (Click Here)

RANKING BASED IN ANALYST EVALUATION (Click Here)

RANKING BASED ON MEMBER FEEDBACK (Click Here)

Over a period of time it has also built a reputation for being one of the most active associations in the country averaging one event every month for the welfare and benefit of the channel community. Besides, the association has also pursued the interest of its members overall growth by conducting family get-togethers from time to time. Two of the most popular events involving the entire families of the members are the Diwali Mela and the Holi Mela, which are conducted every year.

During the year, TAIT conducted trade seminars and training programs for the welfare of its members, especially the systems integrator (SI) community. This, according to the association, was induced more as an answer to the concerns expressed by small SI members present in the association, that TAIT was dominated by distributors and resellers and less of SIs. After this feedback, more number of SI-focused activities were held. Mostly driven by vendor sponsorships, these events were targeted at attracting more number of solution providers as its members.

The effectiveness of TAIT's activities also came in the form of its awareness building activities against defaulters and fraudsters by blacklisting them in the community. As a result, a large number of fraud cases were reduced.

Diligently climbing up the rankings
The South Gujarat Information Technology Association (SITA) based in Surat was the next best association as per the result of the survey. Positive member feedback, as well as an improved rating on the various parameters helped the association move up the ranking list.

Last year, SITA was ranked way down at number 18. This is a big achievement for the association, which actively stepped up member welfare activities in the year 2005. Events addressing issues on octroi, VAT and fraud cases were some of the key awareness building activities that it conducted.

SITA scored very high on both members' feedback and analysts rating in most of the parameters to achieve this position. During the year, it also successfully held its annual IT trade exhibition and did a commendable job as far as conducting regular meetings was concerned. It held over 35 meetings throughout the year.

At number three, the Jalandhar Computer Dealers Association (JCDA), made a big jump from its number 17 position last year. A major achievement for this association came in the form of its success in bringing down octroi rates in its local municipal vicinity from five percent to three percent. Besides, the association was able to resolve many cases of cheating and defaulting with the help of the media. JCDA got the highest feedback score from it members.

Bhubaneswar-based Information Technology Association of Orissa (ITAO), is possibly the fastest gainer in this year's ranking. The association was placed number 23 last year and made it to number four this time around. The activities and events were very much similar to what SITA did in the year in review. Coupled with positive feedback from members regarding meeting and taking up members issues helped the association come in the top five associations.

Others in the reckoning
At number five is the Vidharbha Computer Manufacturers and Dealers Welfare Association (VCMDWA), based in Nagpur. This year's ranking actually disfavors VCMDWA as it has dropped from its previous year's number third position. As usual, the association conducted its regular trade exhibition called Compex with decent success rate. Additionally, it also held a protest rally for abolishment of octroi.

The parameter where VCMDWA lost point was with regards to the drop in membership strength from 160 to 125, a drop of 25 percent. This is surely a setback for the association and can possible hinder its ranking in the future if it fails to get back the lost members. According to members' feedback, this drop is probably caused by the formation of a new association with a different focus from VCMDWA in the same region.

At number six is the New Delhi-based Computer Media Dealers Association (CMDA), which has managed some improvement in its ranking this year. According to member feedback, some of the activities conducted by the association have been well appreciated by the members.

G-10 Computer Dealers Association (GCDA) of Chennai at number seven slipped in its ranking primarily due to decrease in its number of active members. All other associations including Baroda Information Technology Association (BITA) at number eight, Kolkata-based Computer Association of Eastern India (COMPASS) at number nine, Pune-based Computer and Media Dealers Association (CMDA) at number 10, performed reasonably well as far as the role of association is concerned. However, member feedback indicates a laxity in the associations' ability to resolve member concerns immediately.

New Delhi-based Progressive Channels Association of Information Technology (PCAIT) at number 11 was a new association that has shown the potential to scale up in the top rank going by the activities and influence it has garnered as a premier association in the country. It has done well in addressing various issues of the channel community and has received very strong credibility from the vendor community as well, in a short span of time. Many of its achievements have been appearing regularly in the media, indicating its potential as a premier trade body representing the channel community in the country.

Scope to do well
The Ahmedabad Computer Merchants Association (ACMA) at number 12, followed by Chennai's Information Technology Traders Association (ITTA) at number 13, slipped in their rankings due to a decrease in the number of active members. At the same time, member feedback also was not very positive with regards to the number of member welfare activities conducted in the year.

While Pondicherry-based Information Technology Traders Association (ITTA) stood at number 13 and the Uttaranchal IT Trade Association (UITTA) based in Dehradun marked its place at number 14, it was a sad show from the Association for Information Technology (AIT) based in Bangalore at number 15. Despite showing a large representation of around 600 members the association has only managed to get only 250 members in the active participation list. Besides, it also did not conduct very significant activities for the welfare of the channel community.

The next block of 13 associations did not have anything significant to justify high ranks and were ranked in the following sequence:

• Indore-based Madhya Pradesh Telecom & Computer Traders Association (MPTCTA)

• Hyderabad-based Twin Cities Computer Dealers Association (TCCDA)

• Lucknow Computer Vyapar Mandal (LCVM)

• Association of Computer Traders Trichy (ACTT)

• Jamshedpur IT Association (JITA), Jamshedpur

• Computer Dealers Association of Trivandrum (CDAT)

• Coimbatore Computer Dealers Association (CCDA)

• Goa IT Business Association (GIBA)

• Jaipur-based Rajasthan Computer Traders Association (RCTA)

• Cochin-based All Kerala Computer Manufacturers and Dealers Association (AKCMADA)

• Madurai-based Computer And Media Society (CAMS)

• Kanpur Computer Dealers Association (KCDA)

Paper figure
With regards to KCDA, a point that came strongly from the members and analyst feedback was that the association name existed only in papers and that the association was not at all interested in resolving or taking up the issues of its members. In the case of TCCDA also the members felt that the association is not representing their issues in a proper fashion. The members also felt that while welfare activities are low even meetings are not taking place on time. All these things have resulted in a lower feedback rating from members for TCCDA.

The survey finding also points at negative feedback from the member of CCDA. Except for one member many others have rated the associations on a lower side. This feedback has come especially from small dealers who are members of this association, and feel that the association doesn't look after their issues. Cochin lost its ranking due to low level of activities from the associations and hence the members have given a lower feedback score.

Methodology of the survey
Channel partners today are faced with numerous challenges. They have to overcome margin pressure, ensure ethical business practices, tackle payment issues and fight taxation issues. These are issues that cannot be addressed individually. Associations play an important role in addressing such concerns.

However, the effectiveness with which associations function, depends on the participation of members, the activeness of committee members and the willingness of members to raise a collective voice for the industry. Vendors, channel partners and the government know very well that a collective voice commands lot of power.

Hence, we find an association in every corner of the country. DQ Channels short-listed some 50 IT channel associations across India for the survey-based ranking. However, only 28 associations were taken into consideration as only these were found to be active in some way or the other working for the welfare of the channel community.

246 interviews across 28 associations, spanning 26 cities were considered by IDC India for the survey. Analysts met up with office bearers for association feedback. Similarly, few active members were picked up randomly from each association for the member feedback.

To arrive at the results, member feedback were collected on the following parameters: meeting frequency, effectiveness of events, effectiveness of resolving issues, effectiveness of communication, quality of support, welfare activities, ratings on policies, and overall satisfaction.

All the above parameters were taken into consideration with appropriate weightages for evaluating the associations. Three rankings were derived at for the final calculation. The first ranking was done based on the analyst evaluation and the second ranking was done based on member feedback.

Both these rankings were then merged with another equally important parameter i.e. the importance of the city - to arrive at the final ranking.

The city size parameter was put keeping in view the fact that, the larger the city, the difficult it is to run an association. The reason for the same is that in bigger cities you have more number of dealers and vendors operating. This results in more issues, disputes and expectation. Hence we have given a higher score to the association in a bigger city.

This rating is independent of the number of membership of the association. Delhi and Mumbai are by far the largest cities in terms of IT trade and hence were given a higher score of 10. Similarly G-10 and ITTA in Chennai were given a score of eight. Accordingly, other cities were then given relative ratings based on the size of the city.

Collation of information
The survey collected information in three parts. The first was general information about the associations relating to the start-up year, member strength, fees, office bearers, full-time employees and election frequency. This information was collected from office bearers of the association.

The second part focused on activities of associations. Special attention was given to the number of internal meetings held, number of member welfare events (seminars, training programs, exhibitions and others) held, attendance/participation of members in such events and its outcome.

This part of the survey also evaluated associations' ability to effectively resolve issues affecting members and issues between members. The survey also found out if the associations had a presence on the Internet by way of a website and if any business directory of members were published and distributed. The survey also analyzed the influence it has on local governments while voicing their concerns for the IT community.

The third part centered on information from members. The feedback received from them threw light on the effectiveness of member events that were conducted during the year. Based on member feedback, associations were evaluated for the effectiveness of channel issues sorted out by associations.

Special attention was given to find out how members felt about the support provided by the association to members in times of difficulty.

NELSON JOHNY

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