Intel’s 2021 Architecture Day previewed multiple upcoming products, with the likely highlight being the Alder Lake CPUs, which rethinks multi-core architecture by offering both efficient and performance cores, with a new Intel Thread Director selecting the optimal one to be used.
Intel presented a roadmap of process and packaging innovations to power their next wave of products through 2025, which they said will get back to process performance parity – and then leadership.
The main feature of the new program is a new partner portal, which is integrated with Salesforce and provides much quicker access to materials and response times from ViewSonic than was the case in the past.
Some major gaming announcements will have implications for resellers and integrators who work that market, as will a new embedded flash platform for Universal Flash Storage 3.1, while a partnership with Percona around their MySQL Server will be of interest in the enterprise.
D&H has established a new Business Unit around their gaming components and Esports business, and while Esports has been much stronger in the U.S. then Canada to date, they see strong prospects in Canada as well.
The emphasis with the five new offerings, using technology from Addfor, Everseen, cnvrg.io, SAS and NetApp, is on the solutions’ ease of deployment, removing a barrier that has stymied many enterprises from getting AI products into production.
AMD’s 2nd generation EPYC chips, Rome, made AMD’s big push in the data centre, and now with more third-party server vendors on board than ever before, they are looking to extend that edge with Milan.
A study commissioned by Intel specifically in Canada found that most channel partners have suffered from the pandemic. There was a fair amount of optimism for the year ahead however, although many partners said they need help to realize emerging opportunities in the cloud, IoT and AI.
ScalePad’s introductory free trial of their Software Asset Management ends December 31, but the company announced new measures to replace it at their virtual conference for their MSPs on Monday.
The Dell Precision 3240 Compact will compete with the HP Mini and the Lenovo Tiny, at a new low price point – unless a customer opts for the high end NVIDIA Quadro RTX 3000 option, which will be available in October.
The new Cooper Lake processors, and the other components of the Intel announcement, all share a focus on improving AI-related capabilities.
A new Virtual Product Demo program pairs with a Bounty Program that gives a SPIF to channel reps for setting up a customer demo.
Sharp’s new top of the line visual solutions display, the product of a partnership with Microsoft and Foxconn, recently became available in Canada, and Sharp is focusing on its capabilities to differentiate their technology from competitors.
In addition to a new premium family in Dell’s Latitude commercial laptop line, other commercial market products being introduced around CES include new monitors and an updated XPS 13.
Carmine Cinerari, who has led Sharp Electronics Canada since 2008, talks with ChannelBuzz about the company’s re-emergence since its acquisition by Foxconn, and particularly how channel-focused changes in Canada have grown the business.
The companies will establish a Centre of Excellence for customers by the third quarter, and plan to have new solutions out in 2020.
Steelcase makes Steelcase Roam, a mobile cart and wall mounting system designed specifically for the Microsoft Surface Hub 2, and has launched a new program and new IT distribution relationships to help Microsoft partners sell it.
ViewSonic made five separate product announcements at InfoComm 19, but this year, the message is not as much about the individual products as the broader vision that unites them.
The follow-up to last year’s original ThinkSmart Hub 500, which was for Skype for Business, continues Lenovo’s strategy of building out their Smart Office portfolio, and in the teams space in particular.
The partnership with ADVA Ensemble bundles a library of over 50 third party solutions into Dell’s VEP platform, with partners being able to pick and choose the ones that fit their business.
