IBM, EMC announce $3B technology alliance
First Dell, now EMC. IBM is on a major alliance-building binge.
By Carmen Nobel, PC Week
March 24, 1999 8:03 AM PT
IBM and EMC Corp. on Wednesday announced a five-year business and technology alliance worth approximately $3 billion.
Under the terms of the alliance, the second major pact IBM (NYSE: IBM) has entered into in the last month, EMC (NYSE: EMC) will continue to buy IBM disk drives for its Symmetrix storage systems. Future plans are likely to include other IBM components, such as microprocessors and custom chips, officials said.
"We haven't committed explicitly," said Mark Fredrickson, an EMC spokesman. "The agreement is that we'll look at a number of different components. The adoption will depend on how they do in our qualification process."
Currently EMC uses Power PC chips from Motorola Inc. in its Symmetrix systems.
The alliance also will include patent cross-licensing between the two companies, although they remain competitors.
"This doesn't give IBM the ability to release a Symmetrix," Fredrickson said, nor will it mean that EMC storage management software will run on IBM's storage systems.
Earlier this month, IBM inked a $16 billion technology deal with Dell Computer Corp. IBM will supply Dell with storage, networking, semiconductor and display products, enabling Dell to further cut manufacturing costs and market high-end server products.
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