Victron Distributors from 25 countries met recently in Panama for some top flight training – and fun.

It was a convenient location for our Latin American distributors to meet face to face and hear first-hand the priorities Victron has set for itself in terms of product development for their region, the ways in which we are meeting the demands of rapid growth, to provide us with feedback about their local customers, together with some lively open-discussions.

During the event tuition was provided on three important installation topics:

• Advanced VE Configure – a detailed discussion about using the VE Configure tool to achieve tailor-made solutions to suit unique client applications
• Mobile installations – autonomous power supply for Marine and Vehicle applications
• Parallel, split- and three-phase configuration – supplying power to high demand appliances

Attendees also had the opportunity for some hands-on training. Divided into smaller groups they rotated between three live installations allowing them to put into practise the theoretical instruction they had received.

In fact, two distributor meetings were held which were identical in every way except that one was conducted in Spanish, and the other in English in order to make the content more accessible to visitors from, respectively, Central and South America, and also from Caribbean nations.

The events – which had been in planning for a year, and in preparation for many months – were the initiative of David Lopez, who delivered the courses to 55 attendees in company with Jorge Ortiz, David Gutierrez, Juan Alberto Felix, Jan Klumpenaar and our ambassadors in the region: Gerrit Jacobs (Panama) and Heraldo Jara (Chile)

The event borrowed some of the curriculum which has been appreciated by attendees to our well-established European distributor meetings – in which we try to provide liberal access to our corporate thinking, information about our progress, and share our strategic frameworks. Both the European and Lat Am meetings recognise the importance of inclusivity – offering audience participation at informal ‘on-stage sofa-discussions’ which provide the opportunity to ask bigger questions, obtain answers …and which often lead to unexpected benefits for all participants – and even eureka moments!

There was an awards ceremony for contribution and generous sharing which saw presentations go to representatives from Electec (Saint Maarten), Solar Watt Systems (Barbados), Temp-Rite (Trinidad & Tobago) – Baratec (Argentina), Battery Depot (Mexico), and Novum Solar (Peru).

The events provided some well thought-out social events – the crown jewel of which was a trip along the Panama Canal in a 100 passenger private charter boat, during which participants enjoyed a passage through a couple of the locks witnessing how the world’s commerce is efficiently conducted through one of the busiest commercial seaways in the world.

It also provided an opportunity for distributors to network, discuss and share some of the challenges and they face and suggest ways in which they have been able to overcome difficulties and solve problems. The evening entertainment was held at an Indoor Bowling club – a sport in which everyone can participate, relax and enjoy.

Juan Alberto, a Basketball enthusiast, played a high shot taking out all ten pins, the back wall and most of Panama’s electricity grid.

The event organisers were rewarded with an avalanche of positive feedback concerning the commercial and technical information shared; and as for the rest and relaxation – participants were thrilled with the Panama Canal cruise with a number of them mentioning that it was on their bucket list, anyway! Good choice.

Here’s what they had to say:

Veronica Ortega – Petasolar (Republica Dominicana) – “It was one of the best meetings in this sector that I have attended during my life and it was the most creative. We never got bored.”

Fabricio Bussolini – Enertik Chile and Argentina – “technically it was very good, very dynamic. We also enjoyed sharing opinions with other distributors, it created cooperations with other colleagues around the world ”

We’d like to extend a big thank you to all the distributors who were able to attend – and to those who they left back-in-the-office which provided them with the opportunity. Also – well done to the organisers for delivering a very professional and beneficial event.

The conference venue was The Westin Playa Bonita, Panama.

Let’s take a look at the delegates at work:

…and at play: