Storage vendor EMC Corporation has hired nine staff to work inside a new commercial sales division that would drive storage sales in the SME market through its channel partners.
At the same time, the company was conducting a distributor review. It was previously distributing its CLARiiON CX product line through Express Data.
The commercial team would push SAN solutions in the $20,000 price range through partners, the company said.
The new staff would be set a revenue target and it was mandatory for these staff to use channel partners to fulfil the business, said David Henderson, GM, channels and alliances at EMC Australia.
Previously, the vendor had incentives in place for internal staff to use channels, but it wasn't mandatory, he said.
Around two-thirds of EMC Australia's business was with enterprise customers and the remainder with SMEs, Henderson said. Around 60 percent of the company enterprise business was delivered through channel partners.
The SME "external storage market" in Australia was worth around $200 million per year, he said.
Henderson said there was "a tremendous opportunity" for more resellers to targe the entry-level storage market. "SMEs are now demanding more than just boxes, they want services and support in running and maintaining their hardware and software," he said.
Henderson said EMC would run with only one distributor following the review. "I think one is right," he said. "It's not just a box drop -- it requires a back-end to support it," he said.
In February, the company unveiled a refresh of its entire product range including Symmetrix DMX, CLARiiON and Centera models.
EMC also announced on Thursday a new partner certification program which it claimed would enable channel partners to derive more revenue from services.