HP Throws A ProCurve To Its Partners

Hewlett-Packard is expanding its ProCurve networking product line despite speculation that the business unit is about to be sold.

The company next week is slated to unveil two new switch lines and new identity management and wireless management software modules, following a recent report that HP is close to selling off its ProCurve division.

Channel partners have expressed concern over the potential sale and its impact on their ProCurve sales, at least in the near-term.

“It’s at the front of everyone’s mind, [wondering] what’s going to happen,” said Troy Cheatham, government and education markets manager at Complete Computing, Little Rock, Ark. Some customers are inquiring about ProCurve’s future while reports of the potential sale played a small part in one lost deal for Complete Computing, Cheatham said.

Darla Sommerville, vice president and general manager, Americas of ProCurve Networking by HP, Palo Alto, Calif., declined to comment on the potential sale but maintained that it’s business as usual, including the rollout of new switch lines to support the company’s strategy to distribute intelligence throughout the network.

The new ProCurve Interconnect Fabric Switch 8100fl family provides a simpler, cost-effective alternative to a traditional core switch and is built to support networks where features such as security and wireless have been pushed out to wiring closets, Sommerville said. It is the first product line to incorporate technology HP acquired from Riverstone Networks last June.

The family includes 8-slot and 16-slot chassis that support Gigabit and 10 Gigabit blades, offering up to 320 Gbps of switching capacity. The switches are slated for availability in October starting at $27,999. HP also is unveiling the ProCurve Switch 2600-8-PWR, an eight-port Fast Ethernet switch that supports Power over Ethernet. The Switch 2600-8-PWR is scheduled to ship in October with a list price of $899.

HP also is unveiling new modules for its ProCurve Manager Plus 2.0 management platform: Identity Driven Manager (IDM) 2.0, which adds support for Access Control Lists to define network access rights; and Mobility Manager 1.0, a plug-in for WLAN management. IDM 2.0 and Mobility Manager 1.0 are expected to ship in December with list prices of $5,499 and $1,999, respectively.