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CRN and The Channel Company presented the 2026 Best of the Channel Awards on October 13 at Atlanta’s Fox Theatre, recognizing 15 category winners and a Lifetime Achievement honoree. The winners include channel executives, vendors, solution providers and teams whose work centers on AI commercialization, cybersecurity, partner enablement and ecosystem growth.
What happened at the 2026 CRN Best of the Channel Awards
The second annual awards ceremony took place in the Egyptian Ballroom at Atlanta’s Fox Theatre. CRN says the selection process ran for months and used two judging rounds: CRN editors first chose finalists, then CRN’s editorial team and IT-channel judges selected the winners.
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The program presented 15 competitive awards plus a Lifetime Achievement Award. Together, the categories cover individual leadership, channel operations, marketing, AI, security, solution-provider performance and vendor achievement.
Complete list of 2026 winners
| Award | Winner | Organization | What CRN recognized |
|---|---|---|---|
| Best Emerging Leader of the Year | Stacie Nadeau | Ingram Micro | Advanced a solution-focused strategy aligned with AI, cloud and cybersecurity and helped launch a digital experience platform. |
| Best Channel Achiever of the Year | Brook Lee | Rev.io | Built the company’s channel-community function from the ground up, including a role-based platform, MSP marketplace, webinars, training, mentoring, newsletter and podcast. |
| Best Channel Visionary of the Year – Solution Provider | Jim Keller | Quantiphi | Developed an ecosystem-led growth model around an AWS and Snowflake “trifecta partnership” for Data + AI workloads. |
| Best Channel Visionary of the Year – Vendor/Distributor | Gordon Lord | Schneider Electric | Trained and enabled more than 2,300 partners and redesigned the partner experience around simplicity, transparency and consistency. |
| Best Solution Provider CEO of the Year | Jon Groves | Logicalis US | Focused on business outcomes while helping customers address AI acceleration, security risk and infrastructure reinvention. |
| Best Channel Chief of the Year | Wade McFarland | Lenovo | Led North American channel work at a company where CRN reports that more than 90% of global revenue is driven through the channel. |
| Best Channel Team of the Year | TD Synnex | TD Synnex | Was recognized for PartnerLINK, PartnerFirst and Destination AI, a program designed to help partners monetize AI through technical guidance and enablement. |
| Best Solution Provider Team of the Year | Senior leadership team | GuidePoint Security | Scaled growth alongside workforce development, veteran hiring, people practices and a remote-first culture. |
| Best Channel Marketing Team of the Year | Channel marketing team | Zscaler | A 15-person team serving a worldwide ecosystem of nearly 3,500 partners. |
| Best AI Solution Provider of the Year | AHEAD | AHEAD | Helped customers move AI projects from pilots into secure, governed, production-scale systems tied to business outcomes. |
| Best AI Vendor of the Year | Cyera | Cyera | Was cited for AI-driven innovation, a partner-first strategy and products addressing data security, privacy and AI transformation. |
| Best Security Solution Provider of the Year | World Wide Technology | World Wide Technology | Developed the AI Readiness Model for Operations Resilience (ARMOR) with NVIDIA as a chip-to-cloud AI-security framework. |
| Best Security Vendor of the Year | Arctic Wolf | Arctic Wolf | Was recognized for the Aurora Superintelligence Platform, Aurora Agentic SOC, more than 1,000 new partners and expanded enablement. |
| Best Solution Provider of the Year | Quantiphi | Quantiphi | Presented an AI-native services model described as “technology-enabled services-as-software,” with outcome-based pricing. |
| Best Vendor of the Year | Halo | Halo | Was cited for AI-enabled service delivery, enhancements to PSA and ITSM platforms and expanded partner enablement. |
| Lifetime Achievement Award | Felise Katz | PKA Technologies | Honored nearly three decades of customer-focused leadership across infrastructure, storage, networking, security, cloud and AI, as well as efforts to open opportunities for women in technology. |
The themes behind the winners
AI moves from experimentation to commercial delivery
AI appears across the 2026 awards, not just in the dedicated AI categories. AHEAD’s recognition emphasizes governed production deployments rather than pilots. Quantiphi’s winning solution-provider and visionary awards highlight ecosystem partnerships and outcome-based delivery. TD Synnex’s Destination AI focuses on helping partners turn technical capability into revenue, while Halo’s award points to AI features embedded in everyday service-management platforms.
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Security is treated as an operating model
The security winners represent different layers of the channel. World Wide Technology’s ARMOR framework connects chips, infrastructure and cloud operations for AI resilience. Arctic Wolf’s Aurora platform combines security operations technology with partner expansion and enablement. The distinction matters: the awards recognize both technical architecture and the channel machinery needed to deliver it repeatedly to customers.
Enablement and ecosystem scale remain measurable differentiators
Several citations include concrete reach. Gordon Lord trained and enabled more than 2,300 partners. Zscaler’s 15-person marketing team supports nearly 3,500 partners worldwide. Arctic Wolf added more than 1,000 partners, while Lenovo’s channel accounts for more than 90% of global revenue according to CRN’s award coverage. These figures describe the scale of the programs being honored; they are not independent performance rankings across companies.
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Leadership awards recognize infrastructure, culture and community
Brook Lee’s award is centered on building a complete community function, not a single campaign. GuidePoint Security’s team award combines growth with hiring and workplace practices. Felise Katz’s lifetime honor spans multiple technology cycles and emphasizes customer focus and broader participation in the industry.
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- Finalist selection: CRN editors reviewed entries and selected finalists during the first judging round.
- Winner selection: CRN’s editorial team and IT-channel judges evaluated the finalists in a second round.
- Ceremony: The winners were announced at the October 13, 2026 event in Atlanta.
Because the process combines editorial review with industry judging, the awards should be read as recognition of documented channel impact and leadership rather than as a sales-performance league table.
Rank #3
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Event details for channel companies
The official event program offers tickets, tables and sponsorship opportunities for channel organizations. Availability, pricing and commercial terms can change, so companies considering attendance or sponsorship should verify the current details with the event organizers before making plans.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Why this year’s list matters
The 2026 winners show where channel work is concentrating: making AI deployable and governable, translating security innovation into repeatable services, simplifying partner engagement and proving ecosystem reach. The list also makes clear that CRN is rewarding the people and teams that build the operating systems around technology—not only the products themselves.
Quick Recap
Rank #4
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