Partners Stand by AppIQ

It's close to unanimous that AppIQ's OEM partners will maintain their relationships with the storage resource management vendor after it becomes part of Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ). (See HP Chomps AppIQ & Peregrine.)

Sun Microsystems Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW), Engenio Information Technologies Inc., and Silicon Graphics Inc. (SGI) (NYSE: SGI), told Byte and Switch they they will continue to rebrand AppIQ's software following HP's acquistion. Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) isn't saying for certain, but strongly indicates it also will stick with AppIQ.

Two issues cropped up Monday after HP announced it would acquire AppIQ. One was whether HP would continue to allow AppIQs four other OEM partners to sell the software. The other question was whether the others would choose to sell a product that now belonged to a rival. Besides the revenue from OEM deals, the partnerships are an important part of maintaining the commitment to industry standards that is considered one of AppIQ's strengths. (See AppIQ Has a Clue.)

HP VP of ILM Frank Harbist quickly answered the first question Monday when he said HP wished to continue the OEM deals and would stay committed to industry standards. As for AppIQ’s partners, Harbist said he expects them to stay on. “Many of AppIQ’s OEM relationships are with HP partners,” Harbist said.

Yes, but they are rivals as well. Sun is HP’s biggest competitor among AppIQ’s OEM partners, because HP and Sun bang heads across most segments of their businesses, including servers, workstations, and operating systems as well as storage. But as Harbist points out, HP now sells the tape libraries that Sun scooped up when it bought StorageTek earlier this year. (See HP to Stick With StorageTek and HP Upgrade Features OEM Crowd.)That point isn’t lost on Sun. “Yes, we will continue our OEM relationship with AppIQ,” Sun spokesman Ryan Batty says. “Sun and HP are already involved in a cooperative partnering relationship that includes the HP OEM of Sun’s tape libraries, and the intent is to continue partnerships beneficial to both organizations.”

In other words, if HP can make money selling Sun tape and Sun can make money off HP’s SRM, why rock the boat?

Similar “coopetition” already exists in storage. For example, EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) relies on storage rivals HP, IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM), and Sun to sell its VMware virtualization software with their servers. Additionally, HP and Sun already sell Hitachi’s enterprise SAN systems under their own brand. (See HP, Sun Upgrade Hitachi.)

Many of Hitachi, Engenio, SGI, and Sun customers already use AppIQ’s SRM, so keeping the arrangement would be less disruptive. And the deals go beyond sales. AppIQ’s OEM deals called for co-development with its partners, so they’re likely to be involved in their partners’ future product releases. (See AppIQ & Engenio Join for Software, Sun Shines on AppIQ, HDS Expands Software, Services, and SGI, AppIQ Ink OEM Deal.)

Engenio and SGI say they look forward to extending their relationship with AppIQ. Hitachi email a statement calling the acquisition a "positive development" while offering support to HP and AppIQ. The statement stopped short of saying it would continue to sell AppIQ's software, but called the deal "good for the industry and good for our customers."— Dave Raffo, Senior Editor, Byte and Switch