UPSTACK, a platform that combines leading advisors, advanced technology and dedicated customer support resources, announced today it has acquired Digital Planet Communications Inc., a telecom and technology agency based in St. Paul, Minn. The terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
Digital Planet, founded in 2001, provides voice, data, cloud, mobility and IT procurement and support to small and medium business (SMB), midmarket and enterprise customers. The agency specializes in UCaaS, CCaaS, SD-WAN, security, and traditional voice and internet solutions. Digital Planet serves businesses across industries, specializing in health care, insurance and finance.
As part of the investment, Digital Planet’s President Shawn Schmidt (pictured) will join UPSTACK as partner and managing director. Vice Presidents Brent Killen and Jonathan Watkins will join UPSTACK as partners.
“Digital Planet has been a trailblazer in the technology channel for more than two decades,” said UPSTACK Founder and CEO Christopher Trapp. “Their ability to see where the market is going and seize the opportunity is a great match for UPSTACK’s vision and culture. We’re excited to welcome Shawn, Brent and Jonathan to the UPSTACK family, and we’re thrilled to bring their expertise and experience to our advisory team.”
Digital Planet was founded as a telecom agency and adapted its business model to meet customer needs. The company was one of the first to collaborate with telephony resellers to subsidize phone system sales with savings on network services and eventually acquired multiple telephony resellers of its own. Digital Planet also was an early adopter of cloud communications, which centralized support and enabled the company to serve distributed enterprises more efficiently.
With growing enterprise sales, Digital Planet leadership began to consider partnership opportunities to take the business to the next level. “We’ve done a tremendous job growing our organization in the last few years,” said Killen. “To continue bringing on enterprise clients, we needed to team up with a larger brand with dedicated resources that could provide technology solutions and customer support for these large companies.”
Digital Planet customers will benefit from UPSTACK’s extensive support organization but also from a wider range of solutions and specialty expertise.
For more information about UPSTACK’s agency investment program, contact partners@upstack.com.
