Montreal – Samsung Canada is taking a unique approach to its thin client computing offer.
Since Samsung is one of the top manufacturer’s of LCD displays, the company has developed a thin client terminal inside a flat-panel monitor. Currently the company has three models a 17-inch, a 19-inch and 22-inch unit. The 22-inch thin client unit will be released later on this year and pricing has not been established yet.
Marco Nalli, the national marketing manager for Samsung Canada, said that thin clients are a new market for the subsidiary, which up until now has focused primarily on building its printer and monitor businesses. The Samsung thin client units are considerably different than typical solutions from Wyse and N-Computing. Instead of users connecting a monitor, keyboard, and mouse to a shared PC, the Samsung solution is more of an all-in-one with up to 1GB of memory inside.
According to Nalli, Samsung wanted to reduce the real-estate needed for computing. He said that the Samsung thin client series of machines can be used inside banks on teller’s counters, for example.
“We have product available in this area, but we are treading lightly in this market. Our key focus right now is printing and imaging. Thin clients helps us get into an ancillary end to our business along with projectors and digital photo frames. We are walking into this market,” Nalli said.
Nalli added that Samsung does offering computing solutions around the world, just not in North America, but the company’s technology can be integrated into the monitor business and that is what spawned the thin client solutions.
Ron Hulse, the former Compaq Canada channel chief and current head of Samsung Canada’s IT division, said that the subsidiary has secured some small deals with its thin client solutions.
“We finally have a product that gives a chance in the intelligent terminal space. We think this market is going to boom,” Hulse said.
According to IDC, thin client shipments are expected to more than double over the next five years to 7.2 million units worldwide.
Hulse added that the Canadian government issued out specifications on thin clients this year. However, that specification requested that there be a separate monitor item with the terminal.
“The government did not want an integrated unit,” Hulse said.Samsung Canada asked the federal government to make an exception, but they refused.
“We made a case to them on space limitation and energy consumption. We dealt with those two areas. We created a neat product, but right now it is without a big customer,” Hulse said.
So instead, Samsung Canada is taking its thin client solutions to Canadian banks and other organizations, which has giving the manufacturer its first real opportunity to sit down with IT managers.
In the past, Samsung purchasing decisions where made at the operational level because its product base was considered somewhat non-strategic, Hulse said.
“You can make a basic decision on a monitor or a printer and in most cases the IT manager does not own the print output budget. We will win with client preference and with quality with our monitors. Thin clients is where we can develop the business-to-business area,” Hulse said.
Samsung is a new entrant into the thin client market and Hulse will only use partners for this opportunity, he said. The company has already presented its thin client plans to high profile solution providers such as Compugen and Soroc.
Hulse said that these two solution providers are looking for a new opportunity to differentiate themselves over a Wyse terminal, for example.
Samsung Canada has put into place a services response program for its thin client solutions in the channel.
“To be honest, thin clients has been a small effort so far, but it has been opportunistic. We still need to build it out more and we are interested in finding more products that have traction in the business-to-business model,” Hulse said.Currently, the IT division of Samsung Canada is the only area that sells to business-to-business. The company is actively recruiting solution providers and Hulse has set a target of 200 for this year.