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Telarus (News - Alert), a distributor of commercial data, data center and voice services, has formed an engineering department to provide carrier-neutral engineering services to its over 2,000 independent sales partners.

The company also has selected Tyler Smith as VP of Engineering to head up the engineering group. Previously, Smith was a sales engineer at Mountain States Networking and a strategic account manager at CenturyLink (News - Alert) Business. In his new role, Smith, who is a Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert (CCIE), will assist Telarus’ partners architect data center, cloud, SIP, and carrier-neutral/blended MPLS network solutions for clients.

"The creation of the Engineering Department marks an exciting upgrade in the support we offer our partners," David Bashford, president of Telarus, said in a statement. "As our partners work with larger clients who require more sophisticated solutions, it's important that we not only provide access to carrier contracts, but also the ability to design, consult, and provide a level of technical expertise that our partners can leverage to close these deals. Tyler Smith, with his extensive certifications and real-world experience with CenturyLink and Mountain States Engineering, is the ideal person to head up this very important initiative for us."

Smith is eager and confident in his new position.

"I look forward to taking this program to the next level, and really helping our partners close the 'big fish'," Smith said. "My team and I have the ability to make our partners look like heroes to their customers, under their own brand. The larger and more complicated the deal, the more opportunities we'll have to add value through network design review, Visio drawings, carrier selection, and other consulting related to the deployment of large-scale technology infrastructure. I look forward to interfacing with our partners’ customers and growing the department in the coming months to ensure we always have capacity to serve our partners’ engineering needs."

The Engineering Department was previously led by Patrick Oborn, Telarus’s chief innovation officer and who has a Cisco (News - Alert) Certified Network Associate (CCNA) designation. Since it started, the Engineering Department has helped to close over $800,000 in new monthly contracts.

Now, the Engineering program is part of the Telarus Partner Benefits program. It provides free engineering hours to those partners who get the most sales. On the other hand, partners with lower sales volume, can pay for engineering hours on an a la carte basis.