Features - Financial Plays Of The Week:

BELL MICROPRODUCTS EXPANDS RELATIONSHIP WITH QLogic

Bell Microproducts Inc, a value-added provider of storage products and solutions, announced that it has expanded its relationship with QLogic Corp, enabling it to distribute QLogic's complete line of OEM network storage products including controller chips, host bus adapters (HBAs) and Fibre Channel switches. The products span iSCSI, Fibre Channel and TCP/IP technologies.

This agreement extends the commercial distribution agreement that Bell Microproducts has enjoyed with QLogic in North America to include the OEM market.

Bell Microproducts will support the OEM line with its Forecast-Driven Materials Management, Logistics, Automated Tools, Integrated Supply-Chain Management and Value Added programs. The value added offering includes specific technology solutions and comprehensive customer support services: Custom Servers, PCs and Industrial Computers, Storage Device Value Add, Storage System Design and Integration, Kitting services and Custom Retail Packaging services.

Bell Microproducts customer support services include a call center for first-call support, field maintenance services, field integration services and installation services.

QLogic Corp is backed by over 15 years of storage experience and offers the industry's widest range of SAN infrastructure. The world's leading storage vendors -- including Dell, EMC, Fujitsu, Hitachi, HP, IBM, LSI and Sun -- rely on QLogic infrastructure products for their disk, tape and storage subsystems and software solutions.

"Bell Microproducts' 16 years of experience as a value-added distributor of storage products and solutions has proven to be successful for both companies in sales of our SANblade HBAs and SANbox switches," said Frank Berry, vice president of marketing for QLogic Corp. "QLogic is pleased to build on this success and expand our relationship to include more specialized OEM solutions."

"This expansion of our product offering aligns well with our strategy to provide our OEM customers with multiple options from standard chips, boards and boxes to custom boards or fully integrated storage solutions and services," stated Phil Roussey, executive vice president of Bell Microproducts Enterprise Marketing. "We are excited to bring the complete QLogic family of products to our customers. Bell Microproducts understands the specific storage needs of OEMs and applicability of QLogic products, and is uniquely positioned to bring the two together to create optimal customer solutions."