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Hitachi seeking Microsoft and SAP expertise
Thu, 30th Aug 2012
FYI, this story is more than a year old

Hitachi Data Systems is on an active campaign to recruit new Kiwi partners, particularly those with Microsoft and SAP expertise, as the 102-year-old company seeks to 'build an eco-system of new partners' following a re-think in its go-to-market strategy.

Anthony Clarke, Hitachi Data Systems ANZ commercial sales director, says the storage infrastructure market is 'a very crowded, busy marketplace' and despite the company's pedigree it has struggled to 'get a voice'.

Now the company is looking instead to solve application problems and is seeking ‘application-based partnerships’.

“We don't want to become a professional services organisation, we want to help our partners enable the technology. They are the ones who are going to add value around Microsoft and SAP,” Clarke says.

“This means we need access to a whole different set of partners.

“We need to get away from traditional infrastructure sales, where it's about the best price on storage. We're moving up the value chain.”

Clarke was in New Zealand last week as part of the company's 'exploratory and investigation stage' in implementing the new channel here.

The company began the new strategy six months ago in Australia, and has signed up three partners, including Clarity Consulting Group. In Australia partners were recruited in consultation with Microsoft, who helped identify which partners would be best suited for Hitachi Data Systems. Clarke says the company plans to take a similar tack here.

“[In the past] we made some assumptions incorrectly,” Clarke says. “But now we have a very clear strategy and know what we should be doing.”

Clarke says his visit had a dual purpose, with the company also seeking a replacement for New Zealand channel manager Mark Ireland, who recently left the company.

“We will backfill the position, and we are absolutely committed to the marketplace.”

Clarke says the company has recorded its 'largest quarterly revenue ever' in ANZ. The company doesn't disclose figures and Clarke would say only that 'we've seen quarter on quarter double digit growth here'.