Ingram Micro chief exec Greg Spierkel is today standing down after nearly six years in charge.

The world's largest IT distie confirmed the move late last night, lining up COO Alain Monie to fill the hot seat with immediate effect.

Spierkel, who will remain at the company until April to "assist in the management transition", gave no hints that he has a new or higher profile role in the offing.

"It's the right time to leave and spend more time with my family," he said.

Spierkel took charge at Ingram in April 2005 when sales stood at about $25bn, and oversaw its growth to $35.6bn at the end of fiscal 2010. But while sales continued to rise in fiscal 2011, a botched ERP roll out and a challenging market hit Ingram's profits from the first to the third quarters.

The distributor did say last night however that it expects non-GAAP earning for Q4 to exceed analyst estimates and that it benefited from "favourable margins" that resulted from rising disk drive prices caused by the crisis in Thailand.

Company chairman Dale Laurance said Spierkel "ably steered the company through periods of both growth and challenge". Monie said in a PR blurb that Ingram has a "solid" management team and strategy. ®