History 2003: Neartek, OMP and Tera Systemes in Judicial Receivership

Tape virtualization company Neartek no longer has a European subsidiary. It’s former presence in France has vanished, following its liquidation. What’s ironic about this is that Neartek, formerly Partex International, was originally founded in France in 1992, and, after a highly agitated year, relocated its headquarters to USA, currently in Westborough, MA.

Another receivership is under way, due to a depleted treasury, at French storage distributor OMP, a company founded in 1986 by Claude Cardot and Denis Soulier, who had both since left the company. It was probably the first company in Europe to venture into the distribution of 5.25-inch magneto-optical products, with drives from Optotech, then Ricoh, IBM, HP and Plasmon. Under the leadership of CEO Bertrand Grassin over the past 3 years, the company attempted to expand its line to tape libraries and storage software. It also took on Neartek’s maintenance activities and Auspex’s NAS offering, until the latter went belly up also.

The 3rd French firm in receivership, since July, is SAN integrator Tera Systemes, based in Marseille.

This article is an abstract of news published on issue 188 on September 2003 from the former paper version of Computer Data Storage Newsletter.