Madge calls for Unity among resellers

Madge Networks has signed networking distributor Unity as part of a move towards a completely indirect channel.

The switch vendor distributes its commodity products through ETC and Computacenter, but until now has restricted its systems products to ETC subsidiary Data Translation Networking and direct systems integrators.

The firm has lacked wide coverage of the high-end network reseller market, but David Palmer-Stevens, Madge marketing director, said the Unity signing would give it access to a far wider range of resellers.

?Previously we had only used Data Translation Networking for our systems products, but through Unity and DTN together we can reach the whole raft of Bay and 3Com resellers dealing with 200 to 300 node networks,? he said.

Madge said last month it had canned direct sales and was signing up channel partners. It also announced an agreement with the network integrator Anite Networks.

Brian McBride, EMEA president for Madge, said he was confident Unity?s ability to attract and recruit the best resellers would benefit all of those involved.

Richard Chilver, Unity sales director, said: ?Madge?s mixed technology solutions, integrating voice, video and data across a single network architecture over an ATM backbone, give our resellers a whole new set of options for customers.?