Xiotech Copies U.S. Government Marketing With 'Cash For Storage Clunkers' Program

Xiotech on Wednesday introduced a "Cash for Disk Clunkers" program modeled loosely on the wildly popular "Cash for Clunkers" program that has seen drivers trade in old cars for a government rebate of up to $4,500 when buying new cars.

Smart marketers are usually quick to jump on a new trend, fad, or catch phrase, and that's exactly what Xiotech has done with its "Cash for Disk Clunkers" program.

Xiotech said it is doing its part to stimulate the data storage economy by offering business users who trade in older storage equipment $1,000 per Tbyte to buy an equal amount of capacity on new Xiotech arrays.

The "Clunker" cash is good for purchases of the company's Emprise 7000, Emprise 7000 Edge, Emprise 5000 or VM Storage Solution products.

Xiotech is also borrowing from other parts of the "Cash for Clunkers" program by promising significant energy savings from the new storage, which comes with five-year warranties.

But like the federal government's "Cash for Clunkers" program, there are a few limitations.

While business users can claim the "Clunker" cash for as many terabytes of capacity as they want to trade in, the minimum is 1 TB.

And, like the federal program, there is a limit -- and even real government-like ambiguity. The company warns on its Web site, "You don't know how long this program will be around -- Now is the best time to buy so contact us today!"

However, in the pixelated fine print at the bottom, the company said, "Program ends September 30, 2009."