Press Release
Addition of Specialization Program to Hitachi TrueNorth Partner Program Enables Partners to Offer Customers a Combination of Unique, Value-Added Services
SANTA CLARA, Calif. — May 17, 2011 — Hitachi Data Systems Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE: HIT), today announced significant enhancements to the Hitachi TrueNorth™ Partner Program that help drive increased market opportunity, flexibility, expertise and business growth potential for the company’s partners. The centerpiece of the enhancements is a new Specialization Program that enables qualified partners to plan, architect, implement and offer customers value-added services solutions with leading-edge HDS technologies. Together with expanded training and new marketing program development capabilities, the Specialization Program enables partners to grow their business and provide higher levels of customer satisfaction.
“The enhancements we’ve made to the Hitachi TrueNorth Partner Program demonstrate our continued investment and commitment to enabling the success of our partners by expanding their market reach and profitability potential,” said Mike Walkey, senior vice president, Global Partners and Alliances, Hitachi Data Systems. “Our goal is to empower our partners to develop new avenues for growth through joint go-to-market strategies and customized program plans that maximize their sales opportunities.”
Hitachi TrueNorth Specialization Program
Qualified participants in the Hitachi TrueNorth Partner Program can now leverage a combination of specializations to provide customized services and solutions to their customers in the areas of:
- Virtualization Services Specialization – builds partners’ knowledge and capabilities in solving customers’ virtualization implementation challenges of any size. Enables partners to better utilize Hitachi Virtual Storage Platform (VSP), the industry’s leading storage virtualization platform, to extend their customers’ existing storage assets and provide significant cost savings.
- Migration Services Specialization – prepares partners to engage in migration planning and implementation by leveraging the virtualization and tiering capabilities of Hitachi VSP. Only HDS migration solutions allow for migration at the storage level between heterogeneous storage subsystems. With certification, partners can plan and design a solution that migrates their customers’ data quickly with minimal risk.
- File and Content Services Specialization – enables partners to identify, design and implement storage solutions for their customers’ unstructured data. Certified partners can add services in Hitachi Content Platform (HCP) enablement, NAS enablement and data discovery with Hitachi Data Discovery Suite (HDDS).
- Application Specialization and Vertical Solutions – leveraging the Services Specializations and HDS reference architectures that have been tested and proven in HDS labs, partners can add their own unique components to deliver differentiated, low risk and flexible application and vertical solutions to customers. These solutions combine the company’s best practices with Hitachi Technology Alliance Program applications including Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, Symantec and VMware among others, to give partners in industries like health and life sciences, government, and communications, media and entertainment a wide range of potential solutions for diverse customer environments.
“As IT environments continue to become increasingly more complex, customers are looking for their primary solution provider to deliver a comprehensive portfolio of services to help them better architect, implement and manage IT resources,” said Hicham Abdessamad, senior vice president, Global Services, Hitachi Data Systems. “Adding specific specializations and new vertical market solutions to the Hitachi TrueNorth Partner Program gives our partners greater levels of flexibility to offer custom and advanced services that will significantly expand their trusted advisor status with customers.”
In addition to the Specialization Program, the Hitachi TrueNorth Partner Program now includes:
- Expanded lower cost training, including an enhanced TrueNorth Scholarship Program for qualified partners.
- Innovative help desk, call center and expanded PartnerXchange technical support with an easy access portal to download software, firmware and manuals.
- New marketing program development tools such as the Global Marketing Bureau, a web content syndication and lead generation campaign creation tool within PartnerXchange, and a new solutions center information structure to enhance the overall partner experience and drive partner sales.
Partner Support
- Arrow ECS Denmark: “Hitachi Data Systems leads the market in its ability to integrate full VMware VAAI support to provide a robust storage infrastructure for virtual server environments. The Application Specialization offered as part of the Hitachi TrueNorth Specialization Program enables us to deploy AMS 2000 with VAAI more easily and thus demonstrate valuable integration to our customers. This provides a great opportunity for us to strengthen our customer advisory role with leading technology solutions.” – Steen Balle, Business Unit Manager
- Datalink: “Hitachi Data Systems is renowned for its storage virtualization technologies. By combining these technologies with Datalink virtualization optimization services, customers will maximize the overall business value of virtual data centers. Overall, the opportunity to deliver innovative solutions in this area as a certified specialist will help us extend our market reach and add greater value to our customers.”– Suzanne Becker Gallagher, senior vice president, Marketing
- FusionStorm: “The Hitachi TrueNorth Specialization Program complements our virtualization practices and strategy with both VMware and Citrix. We look forward to leveraging the performance-based solutions from HDS to help our customers implement new virtualization strategies.” – Tony Balistrieri, vice president, Vendor Strategy
Web Resources
- Read what Mike Walkey says about the new enhancements
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About Hitachi Data Systems
Hitachi Data Systems provides best-in-class information technologies, services and solutions that deliver compelling customer ROI, unmatched return on assets (ROA) and demonstrable business impact. With a vision that IT must be virtualized, automated, cloud-ready and sustainable, Hitachi Data Systems offers solutions that improve IT costs and agility. With more than 4,700 employees worldwide, Hitachi Data Systems does business in more than 100 countries and regions. Hitachi Data Systems products, services and solutions are trusted by the world’s leading enterprises, including more than 70 percent of the Fortune 100 and more than 80 percent of the Fortune Global 100. Hitachi Data Systems believes that data drives our world – and information is the new currency. To learn more, visit: http://www.hds.com.
About Hitachi, Ltd.
Hitachi, Ltd., (NYSE: HIT / TSE: 6501), headquartered in Tokyo, Japan, is a leading global electronics company with approximately 360,000 employees worldwide. Fiscal 2010 (ended March 31, 2011) consolidated revenues totaled 9,315 billion yen ($112.2 billion). Hitachi will focus more than ever on the Social Innovation Business, which includes information and telecommunication systems, power systems, environmental, industrial and transportation systems, and social and urban systems, as well as the sophisticated materials and key devices that support them. For more information on Hitachi, please visit the company's website at http://www.hitachi.com.
Press Contacts:
Hitachi Data Systems
Melissa Rossiter
(408) 970-4849
melissa.rossiter@hds.com
Lois Paul & Partners
Anastasia Efstratios
(781) 782-5873
anastasia_efstratios@lpp.com
© Hitachi Data Systems Corporation 2011. All Rights Reserved. Hitachi is a registered trademark of Hitachi, Ltd. and/or its affiliates in the United States and other countries. Hitachi Data Systems is a registered trademark and service mark of Hitachi, Ltd. in the United States and other countries. TrueNorth is a trademark of Hitachi Data Systems Corporation.
