The Client Side Of The Green Dialogue

By Heather Clancy, CRN
11:11 AM EDT Tue. Apr. 03, 2007

Whether or not you think the environmental doomsayer “Goracle” Al Gore is just a big bag of wind on global warming, environmental issues continue to steal headlines and they WILL become a fact of life over the next few years for those selling technology solutions.

Expect more federal rulings, like the Supreme Court’s huge decision yesterday to fault the Bush Administration for not setting emissions standards related to carbon dioxide.

I spend at least at least 15 minutes per day right now scanning headlines or having conversations related to green technology issues.

In recent months, our customer base has really taken to the concept

Yesterday, I chatted with IGEL (stands for Innovative German Electronics), which is the fourth-largest thin client vendor in the world (according to figures from IDC) and has been around since 1988. The U.S. division of this company is in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. (aka Citrix technology land) and is actively recruiting U.S. resellers that are willing to share its green technology message. It already is allied with Alternative Technology on the distribution front.

Germany is one of the most environmentally sensitive countries in Europe, according to Stephen Yeo, IGEL’s worldwide strategic marketing director. That has forced the vendor to concentrate on what it calls the total carbon lifecycle electronic footprint for its products, which span a bunch of form factors not traditionally associated with thin computing. Apparently, just about everything in Germany has a green technology energy rating on it. The less carbon the device emits, the less tax you way on it.

IGEL has pulled out some numbers about energy costs from Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute that it says will help solution providers make the green technology case. Those stats are pretty compelling: Using a thin client can save a company up to 51% in energy costs when compared with a PC. Specifically, the daily power consumption of a thin client is 41 watts compared with 85 watts for a PC, according to Yeo. AND that number INCLUDES the power consumption and cooling implications that thin clients have on the server side, Yeo notes.

Jennifer Shine, president with eMazzanti, a solution provider in Hoboken, N.J., that is a vocal participant in the green dialogue, said she evaluated the IGEL technology and was impressed by its onboard features. Her company also works with Symbio Technologies, which touts diskless thin clients for enterprise deployments.

“In recent months, our customer base has really taken to the concept,” Shine says. “In last the month alone we had three customers invest in company-wide thin client deployments for their businesses. That’s up from just a couple of these types of deployments a year, a huge change.”

Can you say the same or are you letting a market-making opportunity slip away? Send your feedback and comments to hclancy@cmp.com.