Fujitsu Canada has partnered with distributor Synnex Canada in an attempt to bring new life to its Lifebook notebook line.
Worldwide Fujitsu is No. 4 overall in notebook marketshare. The subsidiary started selling notebooks in North America five years ago and has built up its marketshare here
to around one to two per cent, said Howard Day, Fujitsu Canada president.
“”We anticipate that to grow substantially and we have a very comprehensive list of products with tablets, pen-based, consumer, corporate and high end mobility notebooks,”” Day said.
He added that in the first quarter of this year Fujitsu’s notebook line grew 40 per cent and overall through the year it is up 11 per cent.
This deal is also a good opportunity for both firms because of the storage products. Currently, Synnex carries only one other enterprise line and the distributor does not have a mobile storage product line in its offering.
“”They can focus and I believe they quote 60-vendor product, which is enough to have good focus on the line,”” Day said.
“”Synnex certainly is a major distributor in Canada and it was the right time to partner. With the maturing of storage and the notebook line we are adding a channel partner that makes sense. I would say both the line of product Synnex carries was definitely complimentary and would be incremental for both companies for sales,”” he added.
Under the terms of the agreement, Synnex Canada will distribute Fujitsu Canada’s notebooks, hard disk drives, keyboards, magneto optical drives, and floppy disk drives to a base of 9,000 resellers nationwide.
In terms of coverage, Synnex will cover eastern, central and Alberta markets, according to Day. “”The warehouse in the B.C. marketplace for resellers who can buy product and pick it up was also intriguing,”” he added.
Fujitsu Canada also has distribution partnerships with Supercom, EMJ Data Systems, Tech Data Canada, and Comtronic. The subsidiary also has a relationship with Azerty, but only in the Quebec marketplace. On the storage side, Fujitsu Canada has also forged distribution partnerships with Supercom, Tech Data, EMJ, and Pro Data for just Western Canada.
Synnex Canada was contacted for this story and did agree to provide a spokesperson to be interviewed. But, as of press time, the Synnex Canada spokesperson was unavailable.
The distributor did provide this prepared statement: We are very pleased to have Fujitsu on board because their products are a great complement to our current offerings and will enhance our ability to give our resellers a selection of leading technologies at competitive prices.
Synnex Canada will also handle Fujitsu Canada’s line of dot-matrix printers and supplies. Also Synnex and EMJ will carry the subsidiary’s ScanSnap product. However, other Fujitsu scanners will still be on a direct to VAR model.