Patriot seeks resellers for UK market charge
US vendor unveils plans for UK expansion
US vendor Patriot Memory is looking for VARs to help it create a strong foothold in the UK memory arena.
The 20-year-old company has appointed Target Components as its first official UK distributor, but in time said it may take on another two or three.
Jennifer Petersen, senior European sales manager at Patriot, told CRN: “Our brand is very well known in the US, but not so much in Europe. We recently opened a European office in Amsterdam and are now looking to expand across Europe with the UK as a core focus.”
Paul Cubbage, managing director of Target, which is stocking two of Patriot’s product lines, said: “We are in the process of putting together a Patriot reseller programme that will include rebates for VARs. The details of the scheme are due to be announced over the next four to five weeks.”
According to Cubbage, Patriot represents a good margin opportunity for resellers.
“One of the problems in the memory market is that there are a lot of budget memory products around and then in the mid-market Kingston Technology is the market leader, but is over-distributed so no-one makes any money,” he said. “Patriot offers a clean distribution channel and good margin opportunities for resellers.”
Ann Keefe, sales director UK and Ireland, at rival Kingston, said: “Patriot is a very small player in the UK and it doesn’t have any representation or local support over here, whereas we have been here for 10 years and have more than 200 UK staff. It will be interesting to see how Patriot will fare with its plans.”