HP acquires 3Com

HP has announced the appointment of Lorna Hardie as the HP Networking Country Manager for South Africa and Derek Wiggill as the HP Networking Country Manager for Africa.

Hardie has been with HP for well over ten years. Prior to her role within the HP Networking division, Lorna developed and managed the HP Imaging and Printing Group’s business for English Speaking Africa and at a latter stage was responsible for channel management across Southern Africa. She will continue to manage the overall HP Networking business across the board including sales and marketing, product management, account management, forecasting, planning and training.

Wiggill has been with 3Com for three years and in his new role at HP, he will be responsible for defining strategy for the company beyond the borders of South Africa and driving innovative solutions that benefit partners and customers.

“Derek has an excellent track-record and will help to drive future growth in Africa.  His extensive experience in telecommunications, consultancy and channel management on the continent makes him an excellent fit for this role,” says Hardie.

“Companies are looking for ways to break free from the business limitations imposed by a networking paradigm that has been dominated by a single vendor.  By acquiring 3Com we are accelerating the execution of our Converged Infrastructure strategy and bringing disruptive change to the networking industry,” she adds.

HP will integrate 3Com’s network switching, routing and security solutions with its existing HP Networking solutions, creating a comprehensive portfolio for customers. Combined with HP’s global reach, the expanded portfolio solidifies HP’s Converged Infrastructure strategy, which is built on the integration of servers, storage, networking, management, facilities and services.

With this integration, customers will be able to simplify their networks, deploy an edge-to-core network fabric for the enterprise and improve IT service delivery capabilities.