Scale Computing is expected to sign an EMEA distribution agreement with Ingram Micro, following its distribution deal for the US. 

The company signed up Avnet in January, with whom it has 52 nAvnet IBM authorised partners together with 2 boutique distributors (Promark and Interwork Technologies). 

Scale provides SMB-focused unified clustered storage solutions and handles SAN and NAS out of the same pool. Its clients tend to not have a SAN administrator and start from 5-10 TB and add 1-2 TB at a time when growing. 

Go Scale Computing

Attachmate is a winner as it walks away as the new owner of Novell, after a $2.2 billion buy-out. Attachmate, a smaller software company than Novell, is owned by Francisco Partners, Golden Gate Capital and Thomas Bravo.

It was Microsoft who opened the door for the $2.2b sale by organising a consortium to add $450m cash into Novell's coffers in return for surgically removing some of its IP rights portfolio. This was not generosity on the part of Microsoft (did you think?) but an action to keep trolls out of specific software patents that Microsoft va Read more...

The ServSwitch Freedom is a 4-port KVM switch for simplifying USB keyboard/mouse access to multiple computers. 

The user switches ports by moving the mouse from monitor to monitor, hotkeys or front panel. 

The devices uses True Emulation technology to ensure all characteristics of the connected peripherals are passed to each system. 

No software installation is required on the connected computers. 

 Go to Black Box ServSwitch Freedom

Partners are "a fundamental element in Cisco's DNA, says Edison Peres, Cisco's Senior VP WW Partner Organization. Cisco is actively recruiting partners to help the company fill geographical gaps, application and solution gaps and new market adjacency gaps.

(Market adjacency is CEO John Chambers strategy to focus on catching "market transitions" as they collide with Cisco's core business. At this moment, Cisco has identified and is funding 37 concurrent "adjacent" projects.)

In a recent webcast on Cisco's global channel sales strategy, Peres pointed out 80% of all of Cisco's business is done through partners.

"... there are 18,000 in Cisco sales and marketing but we have 288,000 channel employees and we want to empower them and not be in conflict with them," Peres stressed.

He mentioned partners can increase their value to their customers through various Cisco certifications in unified communications, security, WLAN, and more. (This is controversial in the sense that certifications can be mandatory and cost the channel real money while bringing substantial revenues into Cisco. Cisco would of course claim this is money well spent in order to make money.)