ProCurve emphasises channel importance

Hewlett-Packard’s (HP) ProCurve networking division has hailed the channel’s role after it was placed in second spot behind rival Cisco in a recent glut of research.

Market watcher Dell’Oro placed ProCurve second behind Cisco for global enterprise networking vendors, while Synergy Research had ProCurve in the same position in the Ethernet switch market. Analyst Gartner’s latest Magic Quadrant for Global Campus LAN had Cisco as the only leader and ProCurve as its only challenger.

Reflecting on the research findings, Jon Weatherall, HP ProCurve country manager for the UK and Ireland, told CRN the vendor’s channel has been an essential component in its progress.

“We have had a good year and the research has confirmed our number-two position behind Cisco,” Weatherall said. “We are seeing sequential and year-on-year growth, which is good because we are outdoing the market and the competition.”

Weatherall added that ProCurve has had a number of new product releases in the past year, which have enabled its VARs to go back to their customer base and add further value.

“Our channel has grown to 1,510 UK VARs and I think this will rise due to our low-end offerings,” he said. “We also recommend our resellers to go back to their customer base and discuss upgrading to wireless.”

Weatherall added that ProCurve has been marketing to raise end-user awareness and has been working with the channel to help them communicate with end-users.

Mark O’Hara, managing director of reseller Hydra, said: “We have resold for ProCurve in the past and its kit has a strong reputation. However, some resellers are less convinced by HP, which does not seem to have that many feet on the ground in terms of employees.”

ProCurve gives resellers the edge

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