Gateway rocks channel policy

The high-margin server businesses of distributors Northamber and Norwood Adam have taken a knock after PC vendor Gateway severed ties with its partners claiming they no longer play a part in its strategy.

The former direct manufacturer has cancelled its contracts with Northamber and Norwood Adam with immediate effect, following the absorption of its ALR high-end server unit and the decision to establish a single tier reseller layer.

The move will leave Norwood Adam without a high-end server supplier, while Northamber will be left with IBM RS/6000 servers. The decision follows the revelation in July that Gateway intended to merge ALR with its desktop business. Northamber and Norwood Adam declined to comment.

The manufacturer has set up Gateway Partners, a division to service former ALR resellers and sign up additional ones, to sell Gateway PCs, notebooks and servers - a combination of direct and indirect selling. Gateway will continue to fulfil large PC and notebook orders. It has also set up an accreditation programme for dealers.

Justifying the hybrid strategy, Michael Maloney, Gateway director of marketing EMEA, said the manufacturer was 'more efficient than most logistic distributors. But there is no way we will sell high-end servers direct.'

Gateway is on the lookout for 150 additional resellers by April 1999.

Karl How, sales manager for Gateway Partners, claimed the vendor inherited about 100 dealers from the ALR operation and only 20 are authorised.

The PC manufacturer is also pushing sales through its UK retail operation and has opened what will be its flagship store in Kingston-upon-Thames, Surrey and another in Croydon.