HP ProCurve encourages partners to enter solution space

HP ProCurve has undertaken two initiatives to address the data center needs
and improve the efficiency of network applications of its customers. The company
has launched switches for the data center and has also build an open source
platform (HP ProCurve One) that will enable its customers to integrate a host of
applications on to the data center switches. HP ProCurve will be driving the
initiative and the products and solutions through its channel partners. While
some of the products and solutions will be implemented by existing partners the
company will also be adding newer set of partners to take their products and the
concept further. At present the company has more than 500 partners on board.

Talking about the same Amol Mitra, Marketing Director-Asia Pacific & Japan,
ProCurve Networking Business mentioned, “We are not looking at a specific number
of partners for this initiative and it will depend on a case-to-case basis.
Through this initiative both our customers and partners will benefit since HP
ProCurve will become their single point of contact for the post-sales issues. We
will help them do troubleshooting and root cause analysis. This way the partners
will be comfortable in taking these solutions to the market.”

HP ProCurve has built an open service platform whereby the company's alliance
partners including Avaya, Microsoft, McAfee, Riverbed and F5 can write their
applications on the platform and integrate it into a switch. Since the above
alliance partners specialize in specific applications they will be writing their
own applications on this blade. Thus the customers can buy a single switch and
integrate applications on it and thereby reduce their administrative costs and
complexity. Previously the customers had to purchase separate appliances to get
various functionalities.

In addition, with only one network management platform, lesser number of
equipments to manage, lesser usage of power the customers can save considerable
costs and at the same time operate in a more greener environment. This also
leads to reduction in the TCO, a key concern of organizations in view of the
current economic slowdown.However, the above initiative will also benefit the
channel partners in a number of ways. This will enable them to work with
multiple partners to deliver a multi-vendor integrated, interoperable, tested
and certified solution. Earlier the channel partner used to handle the entire
process of integration for their customers, including selecting of switches,
testing and certifying the same in their premises.