Storage vendor Tintri closes its only Australian office

Virtualised storage vendor Tintri is closing down its only Australian office in Sydney,

A Tintri spokesperson said the vendor would consolidate its Asia-Pacific operations and that the Australian market would now be serviced out of Singapore.

"We continue to grow our channel and see healthy demand from customers across the region for VM-aware storage," said the spokesperson.

Tintri declined to comment on the fate of its Australian employees and the reasons behind the "consolidation".

Tintri global channels vice president Eric Berry told CRN: "We will continue to do business in Australia and New Zealand and will be leveraging our distribution partners at a much more strategic level."

Tintri was first represented locally through Sydney reseller BEarena and Melbourne partner Southern Cross Computer Systems prior to the vendor launching an Australian arm in February 2014.

In July that same year, Tintri signed distributor Observatory Crest, later acquired by Arrow. In October 2014 the vendor announced Avnet as a new Australian distributor.

Avnet marketing and business innovation vice president Michael Costigan told CRN the distributor had been contacted by CK Chan, Tintri senior director for Asia-Pacific: "He said they saw an opportunity to consolidate the operation from Singapore and they had decided to do so."

Costigan said that this will have no impact in the partnership and that Avnet sees strong demand for Tintri's VM-aware product in Australia.

Logicalis director of marketing and alliances Oliver Descoeudres said that his company was aware that Tintri would be withdrawing from the country.

"It has some impact but we will continue to work with Tintri. We've been having discussions about having local support and how to work with them locally," he told CRN.

"There will be some customers that want a vendor with a local presence, so there will be some impact."

Tintri was established in 2008 and is headquarted in California. The vendor has two other offices in the USA and in London, Singapore, Munich and Tokyo.