Dell & Extreme Networks joint business venture

Extreme Networks has gone into partnership with Dell to offer a storage solution for data centre customers.

It plans to sell its Summit X450a switches with Dell's EqualLogic iSCSI with an APAC launch date expected soon.

Simon Barnard regional director for Extreme Networks A/NZ said the deal is still in the negotiating phase.

"It's been announced in the U.S. and we are working though the model details and pricing here," he said.

"Resellers will be able to benefit from this deal because Dell resellerscan buy the switches from us.

"We are a specialist ethernet switching company and our channel model  is very much about partnering with other vendors. The idea is to get good value in high performance switching.

"We are doing a lot of work with suppliers and enhancing our offering. We are good partners for these other vendors because we don't compete with them. "

Justin Boyd, server and storage manager, Dell A/NZ said the it is currently reviewing the venture for Australia and talking to customers and partners to determine local demand.

Paul Hooper, VP and general manager for the Volume Products Group at Extreme Networks said customers are converging storage on to ethernet technology to drive down costs, boost simplicity and performance.