DataCore looks at reshaping UK reseller channel

Tony Clay has been appointed sales director at network management vendor DataCore with the responsibility of developing the channel in the UK, Scandinavia and the Benelux countries.

Tony Clay has been appointed sales director at network management vendor DataCore with the responsibility of developing the channel in the UK, Scandinavia and the Benelux countries.

Clay, who is promoting the company's network management software, an operating system for storage area networks (Sans), was previously sales chief at ATL, now part of storage vendor Quantum. "The software can use systems that are redundant and gives them a new lease of life," he said.

Software to manage Sans is becoming more important with the implementation of fibre channel technology. This has opened up the distances that data can be moved and increased the number of components involved as millions of new tasks become possible.

With the huge increase in the number of components involved in storage networking, the industry is moving in the direction of non-propriety solutions to allow more product compatibility. "We are backing away from the propriety solution and allowing multi-vendor products to be used with our software," said Clay.

According to Clive Hailstone, general manager of Cisco products at distributor Computer 2000, a lack of standards is the only obstacle to non-proprietary solutions. "I believe that it would be fair to say that non-proprietary solutions are absolutely the best way to go forward, and the market is going that way, but the industry as a whole must drive standards," he said.

Clay has a philosophy that values the channel highly and recognises its important role in the supply chain. "Resellers identify the demand for the software and DataCore sells all of its products through the channel and is using people who understand storage and storage products," he said. "Resellers have always taken commodity products and given them added value. This is an opportunity for dealers to add more value through service and support."

He explained that DataCore is prepared to assist resellers with their product placement. "We like to be involved with the reseller community to assist them in ensuring the product we supply is used properly. We do not want to be in control, but we want to play an active role in the implementation of the products," he said.