Managed IT Services - Storage

Here's another segment with lots of players, but dominance by only a handful. Five brands managed to make it to the Users' Choice club in this segment this year, with HP and IBM sharing the top spot amongst 100-499 employee enterprises, and HP leading by a wide margin in the 500-1000 employee enterprises. The remaining three brands, viz. 3I Infotech, Wipro, and Bharti trail far behind, and didn't get enough votes to make it to the 100-499 category.

Unfortunately for HP and IBM, brand loyalties aren't as high for them in this category, as they were in some of the others in managed services domain. While 82% of respondents who were using IBM's managed storage services in 100-499 employee enterprises said they're likely to remain with IBM in the future as well, the remaining 18% weren't sure which brand to switch to. A similar situation exists with HP, at 67% brand loyalty and another 33% users who weren't sure which vendor to switch to. In the 500-1000 employee enterprises, Wipro and Bharti enjoy 100% brand loyalty amongst respondents that were using their services.

So why should you choose managed storage services from HP and IBM, the top two vendors in this space? In HP's case, all users using its services in the 100-499 employees space cited brand value as the key reason. 50% of them cited product reliability and after sales support/services each. Among those likely to opt for HP services in the future, 75% cited brand value as the key reason followed by reliability at 50%. In IBM's case, 91% of existing users quoted reliability as the main reason, followed by brand value. For future purchase, its situation was similar to HP's in brand value, but in initial price and after sales service/support, it garnered fewer votes. In 500-1000 employees category, reasons for current usage by a majority of both IBM and HP's users is brand value.

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