Gateway “channel only” proposition gathers momentum
The famous ‘cow print’ PC brand, acquired by Acer Group in 2007, is set to return as a channel-only product which will offer, "a unique proposition for our partners,” claims Kevin O'Donoghue, EMEA Product Business Director for Gateway.
The firm kicked off its recruitment drive in March, with an ambitious objective of recruiting 1000 resellers in 5 European countries. Six months later, the firm claims to have signed up around 20 top tier UK partners and around 200 resellers for its range of desktops, servers and storage infrastructure available via distributor C2000. However, the firm has not named any of its UK partners.
“[Most hardware], is just a piece of tin – 90% of the components are the same,” explains O'Donoghue. “[Purchase] price is not the biggest factor for the channel; it is often the cost of doing business with the brand.”
O'Donoghue claims Acer Group has spent the last few years designing a purchase, support and managed service enablement platform that reduces the cost and hassle for channel partners. Unlike rival vendors that sell the same product across multiple routes with hundreds of partners, Gateway is going to cap the number of top tier partners at 50 per country.
According to O'Donoghue, there is a distinct need for a brand that is not sold directly through retail or e-tail and points out that Acer already has all the other routes covered with its Packard Bell, E-machines and the main Acer brand. Gateway will not publish RRP and will keep the number of base configuration to a minimum, with all products focused on “professional business” customers serviced exclusively by VARs.
The entire product portfolio is available with a Gateway-supplied range of managed services enablement products called Onsite Manager and Service centre. These tools provide advanced remote management tasks such as status monitoring, asset management, patch management and security assurance.
The notion of a channel-only brand is an interesting idea but it is uncertain whether the firm can and will police its philosophy and stop e-tailers and retailers selling its products. It is also unclear why firms such as GatewayPro Solutions and Servers Direct, both found easily via search engines, are selling Gateway products via the Internet.
