Dell To Buy The Networked Storage Company

In its second storage-related acquisition in two months, Dell said Friday that it plans to pick up The Networked Storage Co., which specializes in moving customers to IT data storage systems.

Terms of the deal weren't disclosed. Located in the United Kingdom, the storage company is privately held and has a customer roster of leading European financial institutions. Early last month, Dell acquired storage area network provider EqualLogic for $1.4 billion.

The Networked Storage Co. pointed to the success of its Point of Proof methodology, which provides auditable end-to-end service over storage networks for IT infrastructures. Dell's VP of global infrastructure consulting services Stephen Murdoch said in a statement that Dell plans to incorporate the storage company's "expertise and world-class methodologies as part of our consulting offerings and scale globally."

Formed in 2002, The Networked Storage Co. describes itself as "an independent, specialist, execution-oriented storage and server consulting company."

Dell's new moves in storage could cause it to bump up against EMC, its long-time storage partner. At the same time, EMC is moving into new markets, particularly through its ownership of server virtualization specialist VMware.

The companies said the acquisition won't be final until all closing conditions are met.