News

Xsigo targets Europe with Arrow to expand local presence
2011-12-02
Already working together since 2008 in the United Kingdom and Ireland, virtualized data center infrastructure vendor Xsigo Systems has expanded its partnership with Arrow ECS through a pan-European distribution agreement spanning 27 countries. This agreement draws from Xsigo’s virtual I/O technologies and Arrow’s server, storage and virtualization expertise to create a highly effective combination. Arrow ECS' relationships with suppliers including EMC, IBM, Oracle and VMware allow it to build and document reference architectures that are blueprinted answers to today's most challenging data center issues, such as virtual server performance, cost containment, and infrastructure scalability. Solution providers will be able to demonstrate these technologies live using Xsigo equipment installed at regional Arrow demonstration centers. Beside Ireland and the United Kingdom, the partnership between Arrow ECS and Xsigo spans effectively and immediatly over the Benelux (Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands), the DACH region (Austria, Germany, Liechtenstein and Switzerland) ad Scandinavia (Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden). More regions may be added later, in response to the growth of the demand for Xsigo products in EMEA.

Distributors lose industry share in 2011
2011-08-31
According to the last Canalys report, the growth of the distributors does not match those of the rest of the industry. The Canalys IT Industry major vendor (Apple, Cisco, Dell, EMC, Google, HP, IBM, Intel, Lexmark, Oracle, Microsoft and SAP) grew revenue 18% worldwide on average in the first quarter of 2011. In comparison, the big four distributors (Arrow ECS, Avnet TS, Ingram Micro and Tech Data) managed 11%, with many smaller distributors faring worse than this. Distributors have blamed recent disappointing results on excess inventory, poor retail demand, sluggish sell-out and weakening economies. They have comforted themselves by making peer group comparisons where sales-out data shows "we are performing as well as the others, so please blame the market for our results, not us!" And while these reasons are valid justifications, Canalys argues that distributors need to see the bigger picture and realize that for the first time in a decade industry trends are conspiring against them.

According to the report, distribution thrived for the last 10 years thanks to rapid notebook and netbook adoption and the virtualization of the server room, with two-tier distribution at the heart of the routes-to-market for both B2B and B2C vendors. But the growth drivers of the industry have now changed. Mobility is still booming, but now on the back of smaller devices, notably smart phones and pads, which are more and more sold either directly or through service providers. The server and storage markets are healthy, driven by data center activity and cloud applications. On top of these industry changes, the world economic growth is mainly coming from economies beyond Western Europe and the US, where the top 4 distributors are at best weak, at worse absent (MEA, Russia, Japan, etc.) : in these countries, local distributors will outgrow them, with already some local giants like Merlion in Russia for example. All of these factors combined are set to cause headaches for distributor executives for at least the next two years. The report concludes with a list of recommandations for the distributors to follow, if they wish their growth to match the industry, one of which is to go East as soon as possible…

Stonesoft gets into the cloud
2011-08-29
Finnish security vendor Stonesoft offers its resellers to become security operators thanks to its new MSSP. This bundled managed security offer includes a cloud-based management platform. Licenses related to this platform is free : VARs and system integrators simply pay an annual fee based on its use. This fee is calculated on the number of managed sites (whatever the number of installed UTM), with a flat rate of around €60 and no exit penalties. This simple pricing has been decided to make the MSSP offer as attractive as possible. Stonesoft French office acts as a pioneer, as it has developed MSSP bundle for about one year. The other countries should follow before the end of the year.

According to Léonard Dahan, France and Benelux country manager, "with MSSP, resellers can become an interesting alternative to classic operators, thanks to a greater proximity and reactivity". MSSP will also allow Stonesoft to enter more agressively the SMB market, as it is usually stronger on major accounts. Thus, some of its distributors, like Afina or Itway, will play a major role in the success of this offer, although the others (Amosdec and Computerlinks, which are more dedicated to major account market) may also distribute it through their channel network. Léonard Dahan hopes to sign 2-3 VARs for each main French city, that is about 30 partners by the end of the year. This is enough to give an idea of ​​the potential in other countries…

Arrow ECS gets Oracle software
2011-06-15
Austria : infrastructure, network and security VAD Arrow ECS has been appointed official distributor by Oracle for its line of software products. Both companies were working together previously on Oracle (Sun) hardware products. Thus Arrow ECS is able to carry in the country the whole Oracle offer.

Arrow ECS gets a Cloud-service director for EMEA
2011-06-02
Network, security and infrastructure VAD Arrow ECS has hired Frédéric Braut from Websense to become its new Cloud Service Director for the EMEA region. Operationally, Frédéric is also in charge of the Cloud business of Arrow ECS in France, ASPlenium, a business which may very well be duplicated in the other countries where Arrow ECS is present.