HP And EMC To Sever Reseller Relationship
Over the last few months, HP has ramped up its enterprise storage strategy with a number of announcements -- the acquisition of Transoft, the OEM agreement with Hitachi, the release of HP Equation storage architecture and MC256 SAN product -- all of which have eroded the reseller agreement HP has long had in place with EMC. The other shoe finally dropped in the relationship and effective June 30, HP and EMC will sever the relationship that allows HP to resell EMC's Symmetrix SAN product line.
In a June 21 press conference, hurriedly called with just several hours notice, Marilyn Edling, vice president and general manager of HP's Enterprise Storage Business Unit, said that sales of new HP products such as the MC256 have far exceeded projections in every sector and global market and even in non-HP-UX shops. She added that HP has been "very successful" in head-to-head competition with EMC in large accounts. Those facts, coupled with what she referred to as EMC's reluctance to offer integration choice as related to storage products, has led the two firms to mutually agree to end the relationship.
She added that HP will continue to resell EMC products through June 30 and will continue to provide separate support agreements. She also said that HP will continue to integrate and support EMC's Symmetrix products in HP SAN architectures.