Hewlett-Packard on Thursday unveiled new storage, networking and virtualization offerings as part of its ongoing campaign to bring enterprise-level functionality to small and medium business customers.

The new SMB lineup includes StoreVirtual Storage, a scale-out storage product based on HP LeftHand and ProLiant Generation 8 server technology. Supporting virtualization is the goal here.

HP is beefing up its Client Virtualization SMB Reference Architecture for Citrix VDI-in-a-Box, the SMB-focused desktop virtualization offering Citrix gained in its acquisition of Kaviza last year, enabling it to support 50 percent more users.

Also new is HP StoreEasy Storage, which handles file and application workloads and features deduplication and encryption. This product, which supports up to 10,000 users, helps SMBs deal with growing amounts of unstructured data being generating by users with mobile devices.

[Related: HP Expands SMB Switches, Financing Options]

Vendors often make the mistake of trying to force-feed enterprise products to smaller customers simply by slapping the "SMB" label onto them. This isn't what is happening here, though, as HP partners are pleased with the level of attention to the needs of SMBs they are seeing in the new products.

"These new offerings look like perfect answers to many of the troubling issues that SMB companies are facing around storage, financing and mobility," said Arlin Sorensen, CEO of Heartland Technology Solutions, an HP partner in the Midwest, in an email.

John Gunn, president and CEO of ISG Technology, a Salina, Kan.-based HP partner, recently closed an approximately $1 million deal comprised entirely of HP products, including servers, storage, networking and HP financing.

"There are thousands of small resellers in the channel that need to have virtualization, storage and networking solutions for their SMB customers," Gunn told CRN. "HP has been talking about catering to SMBs for some time; it appears they are on the right path."

NEXT: HP SMB Partners Bullish On New Products

Travis Fisher, executive vice president at Inacom Information Systems, a Salisbury, Md.-based HP partner, has deployed LeftHand previously and has found virtual storage to be a good fit for the SMB space.

"Standalone SANs are expensive to build up. A lot of organizations are beginning to see benefits from sophisticated management but don’t really have enough data or budget to have that kind of infrastructure right now," Fisher told CRN. "I see StoreVirtual as a great gateway for walking organizations with 100-plus users into a SAN-like solution, one hardware generation earlier than they would otherwise find cost-effective."

On the networking side, HP's new M220 Series Access Point comes with clustering technology that allows up to 10 network access points to be configured as a single network entity, and also features a web-based wizard interface.

PUBLISHED NOV. 2, 2012 The HP StoreVirtual Storage 4130 and 4330 models will be available Dec. 4 and are priced starting at $11,500. HP's StoreEasy Storage system will be available on Dec. 10 and is priced starting at $5,192 for 8 Terabytes of capacity.

HP's M220 Series Access Point will be available Nov. 12 from HP and its channel partners and is priced starting at $319, with shipments due to begin in December.

HP, through its Financial Services arm, is offering qualified SMB customers the ability to lease the new products without payment for 90 days, and they can also lease select HP equipment at a less-than-zero implicit lease rate.