Compaq's storage push pays off

Despite the slow PC market, the Houston-based PC maker said Monday that it won contracts for storage worth $900m (£628m) since September of last year. The deals represent a victory of sorts for Compaq, which made storage a big portion of its multipart recovery plan. The plan was announced last June and came just a few months before its proposed merger with Hewlett-Packard was made public. Compaq sells a range of storage devices, from basic tape backup systems upwards. However, its most lucrative products include its StorageWorks storage area network (SAN) line, which connects large amounts of disk space to computer networks. Storage has become a jewel for Compaq, executives have said, with profit margins that are among the highest of all of the products it sells. Some of Compaq's new storage clients in the US include DirecTV, which recently purchased $1.8m in Compaq StorageWorks products with both disk storage and tape library systems as part of an overall $9m contract with the company. Meanwhile Dollar Rent A Car Systems has also purchased a handful of Compaq storage area network products.

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