Ingram Micro CEO Talks Growth Surge And Xvantage Vision

‘We want to take the friction out of doing business with us, period. All of this rolls up into one mission: helping our customers grow profitably and confidently by giving them tools, insights and support at every turn,’ says Ingram Micro CEO Paul Bay.

After going public in fall 2024, Ingram Micro is on an upwards trajectory with no signs of slowing down.

A cornerstone of the Irvine, Calif.-based distributor’s strategy has been a shift from reactive to proactive engagement with customers, largely enabled by its Xvantage platform and intelligent digital assistant, Ida.

And Ingram Micro CEO Paul Bay said the company’s strategy hasn’t changed.

“Being public just means we have another audience to communicate with,” he told CRN. “We’re still laser-focused on investing in Xvantage, scaling globally and staying centered on the customer. We’re shortening sales cycles, improving conversion rates and ultimately contributing to top-line revenue growth.”

In May, Ingram reported first quarter net sales of $12.3 billion, an 8.3 percent increase over the prior year and above the company’s guidance range. Gross profit was $828.8 million and net income was $69.2 million.

While the company is no longer investing based on geography, it is scaling its workforce and tools across regions.

“Any investment we make is global by default,” Bay said. “It’s about scale, speed and service.”

Looking ahead, Ingram is focusing on three high-growth areas: endpoint solutions, advanced specialties like cybersecurity and networking and cloud. Its cloud business now manages more than 50 million seats and accounts for 15 percent of company profits.

“It’s not just about selling licenses anymore,” Bay said. “We expect that to continue growing both in terms of profit and strategic relevance.”

CRN spoke to Bay about the growth the company is seeing and how the company is setting its sights on continued growth through its Xvantage platform.

During its first earnings call, Ingram Micro posted an 8.3 percent year-over-year increase in net sales for the quarter. What strategic decisions do you believe were most responsible for this growth?

It’s something we’re really proud of. And just to clarify, when you look at it on a foreign exchange neutral basis, that number actually rounds closer to 11 percent. So we’re talking nearly double-digit growth and that didn’t happen by accident. The biggest lever we pulled was continued investment in our Xvantage platform. It’s been transformational. We’ve shifted our approach from being reactive, waiting for the customer to come to us, to being proactive. That’s thanks in large part to our AI-powered technology, specifically our intelligent digital assistant Ida. Ida can actually analyze quote data and, based on patterns we see from end users, predict when purchases are likely to occur. Our AI and business intelligence allow us to follow up proactively which helps our partners close deals faster and more efficiently. We’re shortening sales cycles, improving conversion rates and ultimately contributing to top-line revenue growth. So that shift in how we engage with partners is a huge piece of our success.

Looking across your regions, how has your global go-to-market strategy evolved to meet shifting demand?

The great thing about Xvantage is that it’s truly global. We’re now live in 20 countries and that creates consistency and scale that’s hard to replicate. It’s one code base, which means the investments we make in North America benefit customers in Europe, Asia and Latin America equally. Take Ida, for example. She’s not just available in one market, she’s rolling out across all Xvantage-enabled regions. This means whether you’re in Brazil, Germany or Japan, you’re getting the same proactive, AI-enhanced experience.

This global consistency allows us to see the bigger picture across geographies. We’re not building one-off, regional fixes, we’re building holistic solutions that scale, which helps us deliver the same high-touch service no matter where our customers are operating.

So what regions are you prioritizing for investment over the next 12 to 18 months?

Honestly, we’re not thinking in terms of geography the way we used to. Previously, we’d look at it from a local investment standpoint and say, “Let’s invest more in EMEA or North America.” Today, because of our platform’s architecture, any investment we make is global by default.

That said, a lot of our investment is around upskilling and scaling teams to support customers in every region. Whether it’s through automated quoting, touchless email-to-order processing or real-time pricing, we’re taking what used to be slow, manual processes and turning them into seconds-long transactions. It’s about scale, speed and service. And thanks to our $600 million cloud investment, 30-plus patents pending and 300 AI/ML models, we’re able to deliver those three things globally.

So what technologies or service areas will drive Ingram’s next wave of global growth?

We see three big areas: endpoint solutions, advanced specialties and cloud. All three are surging in their own ways. Our endpoint business, PCs, notebooks, peripherals, grew almost 15 percent this quarter. That’s well above our company average. There’s a big refresh cycle going on globally and we’re riding that wave. Advanced solutions, like servers, networking and cybersecurity, are another big area. Cybersecurity in particular is seeing renewed interest, but what’s key is that customers aren’t looking for point solutions. They want integrated, outcome-driven services and we’re building our portfolio to match.

And then there’s cloud. It’s not just about selling licenses anymore. We’ve got over 50 million seats managed on our cloud platform and it now accounts for 15 percent of our profits. That’s a big deal. As cloud moves into areas like hyperscaler environments and becomes more services-driven, we expect that to continue growing both in terms of profit and strategic relevance.

Since Ingram Micro went public again, has anything changed in how you make strategic decisions?

Not really. Our strategy remains intact. Being public just means we have another audience, the public market, to communicate with. But Platinum Equity, our private sponsor, was instrumental in helping us accelerate Xvantage early on. Now that we’re public, we’re just carrying forward that same vision with more visibility. We’re still laser-focused on investing in Xvantage, scaling globally and staying centered on the customer. Most of our employees wouldn’t even say they noticed a difference day to day.

So what are your top priorities heading into 2026?

Skill development is a big one, especially helping our teams guide customers through the AI evolution. We’re putting a huge focus on training, internal adoption of Xvantage and empowering our people to be proactive partners rather than reactive processors.

Another big goal is continuing to enhance the customer experience. That means fewer touchpoints, faster service and better insights. We want to take the friction out of doing business with us, period. All of this rolls up into one mission: helping our customers grow profitably and confidently by giving them tools, insights and support at every turn.

Is there anything you want to emphasize that we didn’t cover?

I just want to underscore the difference that Xvantage is making. There’s a lot of talk in the industry, but what we’re doing is real. We’ve built a global platform with $600 million invested, four petabytes of data, 32 million lines of code and a data mesh architecture that supports real-time, intelligent decision-making. It’s not just a better backend, it’s a better customer experience.

This story was originally published on our sister site, CRN.