The Dance For Server Supremacy

Although HP tied with IBM in the areas of product innovation and support, IBM led the group for its partnership programs. "Particularly with servers and mass-storage products, IBM has good programs to nurture first-time buyers," says Don Barnum, IBM product manager at PC Mall Gov, Torrance, Calif. "They also offer bundled solutions to help add profitability to the entire game."

This year's ARC rankings, in fact, indicate that a focus on partner programs makes all the difference. IBM did very well in the partnership subcategory, taking top marks for all seven criteria--three of which were first-place ties with Sun. Although IBM led in only two out of four areas in terms of product innovation and support criteria, the company's superior partnership strategy made it the clear winner overall.

IBM is making partnership a priority, some VARs say. "IBM has made a lot of positive changes, not only in hardware technology, but also in terms of product price points, which makes their hardware attractive to our customers," Barnum says. "They also include additional software, such as the system-management and remote-deployment tools, which come standard, and those play well with the small to midsize customer set we serve."

That's not to say the products themselves are not important. IBM and HP shared the top spot this year in the product innovation subcategory, with HP claiming distinction for product reliability and ease of integration for its ProLiant family, and IBM taking top marks for creating feature-rich products that push the tech envelope with its xSeries servers.

"Dell isn't a real technology innovator, whereas IBM is," Barnum says. "HP has good, solid solutions, but IBM is more on the cutting edge. We know that they will bring out new technologies first."

In August, IBM shipped eight products based on Intel's new processors with 64-bit extensions announced, including a blade server, one- and two-way servers, and a workstation.

"Over the past year, IBM has had a number of new and exciting offerings, which has led us to leadership market share," says Alex Yost, director of IBM eServer X Series, Raleigh, N.C.

And in the coming months, IBM will continue to focus its entry-level server products on helping its partners give customers features and configurations they want quickly, while helping them increase margins, Yost says. Earlier this month, the company unveiled its Express program, which offers partners a menu of prebuilt configurations with guaranteed availability. "We want to drive demand in order to improve business through the channel by giving customers, particularly medium-sized businesses, the choices they need from channel partners," Yost says.