Lenovo, EMC add co-branded NAS devices to joint LenovoEMC Ltd. venture

Computerworld - EMC and Lenovo Thursday extended a strategic partnership to include sales of co-branded network-attached storage (NAS) devices to small and mid-sized businesses and corporate branch offices.

The companies had created a joint venture called LenovoEMC Ltd. in August to build and sell servers storage systems, starting in China.

The two firms announced today that they will each sell co-branded NAS boxes built by EMC's Iomega division.

"Lenovo's record as one of the fastest-growing technology companies in the world and Iomega's heritage as a leader in network storage solutions enables the joint venture to pursue growth opportunities and drive innovation in the SMB NAS market," said Eric Arcese, general managers of LenovoEMC Ltd. in a statement.

Iomega has grown from a maker of consumer and small business storage systems to one that also makes rack-mounted systems with up to 12-drive bays supporting up to 48TB of data. The Iomega NAS storage devices run EMC's LifeLine operating system, which combines advanced notification and management support features.

For example, EMC LifeLine supports fault notification through e-mail and supports more advanced notification through SNMP (simple network management protocol) as well as disk drive spin-down features to save power when NAS devices are not in use.

Lenovo holds a majority interest in the jointly-owned LenovoEMC Ltd.

Lucas Mearian covers storage, disaster recovery and business continuity, financial services infrastructure and health care IT for Computerworld. Follow Lucas on Twitter at @lucasmearian, or subscribe to Lucas's RSS feed . His e-mail address is lmearian@computerworld.com.

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