Dell Computer plans to once again resell storage products made by EMC Corp, according to a report published yesterday.
The companies will renew a sales and development relationship that was ended two years ago when Dell decided to go solo in storage. Dell is expected to announce today that it will resell and help develop EMC's Clariion storage systems, according to a report in the online edition of The Wall Street Journal on Tuesday.
Dell declined to comment, and EMC wouldn't confirm or deny the report, but said an alliance with Dell would make sense.
"It would be a logical step; Dell has been trying to sell its own storage line and hasn't been very successful," said AJ van de Kam, a spokesman for EMC in the Netherlands.
The Clariion line of mid-range storage products stems from EMC's 1999 acquisition of Data General Corp. It consists of standalone storage hardware with a capacity of up to 6.7 terabytes, network connected in either SAN (storage area networks) or NAS (network attached storage) environments. The hardware is typically used for departmental storage by large enterprises and as central storage in smaller organisations. Prices start at about $US83,000, Van de Kam said.
Dell currently has a wide portfolio of storage products that it sells under the PowerVault brand.
A renewed agreement between Dell and EMC is good for both companies, but won't rock the market, according to International Data Corp's research director for storage in Europe, Middle East and Africa, Claus Egge.
"Dell is a reseller of other people's technologies and it doesn't have products in the more high-end storage segment served by Clariion. EMC hasn't been doing well selling Clariion and needs another reseller. EMC has probably made it easier for Dell to come back," he said.
