Rugged laptops are a tiny part of Dell’s portfolio. They are looking to expand that, bringing more functionality from their other PC lines into their ruggeds to give them more feature differentiation in the rugged space.
Panasonic has made major changes to its product set and its channel go-to-market mechanisms in order to better expand in enterprise markets outside their rugged PC stronghold.
The two new devices, the Toughbook T1 and the L1, with the latter designed for landscape viewing, become Panasonic offerings for lesser demanding rugged environments. The N1, their offering above the new devices in the market, has been enhanced.
In addition to providing increased benefits for those partners who elect to sell only Panasonic rugged notebooks, Panasonic has also increased its investment in a channel account team to provide more reps to work with partners.
8GB memory is now standard, up from 4 GB, with the high end model moving from 8GB to 15 GB. The keyboard is now backlit with red rather than white for better nighttime use.
Distributor sees opportunity for VARs similar to one created by IT/voice convergence
