Hammer opens demo lab to boost sales

Storage providers are launching value-added incentives to their products to take advantage of market growth.

Storage providers are launching value-added incentives to their products to take advantage of market growth.

Storage distributor Hammer is to introduce a new demonstration facility at its offices, the SAN Lab, where resellers can try products and have queries answered by staff. The Lab will be open by the end of this year. Hammer's technical partners will also be able to demonstrate their products.

Paul Sangster, joint managing director at Hammer, said: "With regard to training, support, co-operative marketing and accreditation, Hammer is taking the partnership approach and is flexible in the way it works with resellers. We often customise our service to resellers' requirements."

The distributor also plans to run a series of seminars on current storage market trends, and the new solutions that are becoming available. The seminars will begin this month.

Bell Microproducts also plans to open a storage centre for resellers, in a move that looks set to be mirrored by its UK arm. The US distributor, parent company of Ideal Hardware, will provide advice on storage area networks (Sans), network attached storage, fibre channel technologies and storage automation products.

Ideal already has the facilities to follow suit. Alex Tatham, commercial director at Ideal, said: "It is a worldwide initiative for the whole Bell company to promote Sans and high-end storage products. The group has been working on a storage centre idea for some time now, and we hope to have it up and running later this year."

Industry analysts are predicting a three-fold growth in demand for storage within the next three years.