HP Turns To ISVs For More ILM Solutions

The company Tuesday unveiled an enhanced information lifecycle management (ILM) partner program offering its ISVs three levels of technical and marketing integration, said Bruce Cohen, worldwide ILM alliance manager for HP's StorageWorks division.

The goal of the changes is to focus ILM technical and market resources with ISV partners that are most committed to working with HP on developing solutions the vendor can take to its customers and solution providers, Cohen said.

For the channel, it means an expanded portfolio of ILM solutions, he said. "There's no change to our reseller agreements," he said. "If they sell our products and services, they can sell our ILM solutions."

The expanded ILM ISV program will make it easier for HP work with ISVs to develop ILM solutions such as e-mail archiving for small and midsize business customers, and will help the vendor expand the programs and sales tools it offers its channel partners, Cohen said.

Along with the change in the ILM ISV program, HP also signed on three new ISVs to bring solutions to its channel. These include Princeton, N.J.-based Princeton Softech and its Optim Enterprise Data Management solution for tiered storage and compliance; Waterloo, Ontario-based Open Text and its e-mail archiving solutions; and Redmond, Wash.-based Advanced Digital Information and its StorNext data management software.

The program now has about 40 ISV partners, up from about nine when it started just over two years ago, Cohen said.

About half of HP's storage revenue comes through the channel, but a company spokesperson was unable to specify what part of its ILM revenue is accounted for by solution providers.