EMC Corporation, a leader in the data storage industry, is a brand that does not invoke immediate recognition among most consumers. It is easy to understand why: the company sells complicated products and services and its main customers are large companies like itself. But, like companies that sell to consumers, EMC is an active manager of its brand too. Technology advances, markets evolve and customer demands change; so will product line-ups. Thus, along with all these changes, companies must be prepared to realign their brand management strategies, said Steven Leonard, the company’s president for Asia Pacific and Japan.

Leonard, who joined the company in April 2006, brings with him some two decades of experience in the rapidly changing IT industry. In 2007, Leonard, as head of 5,000 EMC employees, helped the company bring in US$1.45 billion in sales for the markets under his charge. He spoke at a seminar on brand management, organised by the Centre for Marketing Excellence at Singapore Management University’s (SMU) Lee Kong Chian School of Business.

Growth of the information market

EMC has come a long way since the company was founded 30 years ago as a memory board manufacturer. It now serves mainly high end enterprise customers with voracious appetites for increasingly complicated storage services. “In brief, we are known widely in the market as a storage company but, through the years, the way in which information is created has been totally transformed,” Leonard said. EMC now wants to be known as more than “just a storage company”, but rather, “an information storage vendor”.

This concept of “information storage vendor” stems mainly from a focus to help customers address the changing requirements of the information landscape and to manage the exponential growth of information. “From our studies, we estimate that information is growing at 60% a year. In five years, the volume of information is going to be ten times more,” Leonard noted.

The growth in data volume, for EMC, is both a challenge and an opportunity. Leonard estimates that the storage market is worth some US$70 billion a year. To have a better command of the market, the company has increased its focus on software management systems. “Today, individuals are creating much of the information and they are largely unstructured. About 85% to 90% of information today is unstructured but it has to be managed and in this regard, they are creating great pressures on companies,” Leonard explained. The company’s brand statement sums up this premise: “Information has the power to illuminate our world. But for this to happen, information must be intelligently and efficiently stored, protected, and managed - so that it can be made accessible, searchable, shareable, and ultimately actionable.”

One vision, many brands

In recent years, EMC – previously only dealing with enterprise customers -- is also somewhat hedging its bets by expanding into the consumer and small business market segments. Rather than building a new company from scratch or invest in creating a new brand, what EMC did was to acquire Iomega, maker of the iconic Zip-drives in April 2008, and a brand name that still holds cachet with consumers, something which EMC hopes to leverage onto as it develops new market segments. EMC also owns a 90% share in VMWare, a fast-growing, trend-bucking technology company that provides so-called virtualisation software that lets users make much more efficient use of their existing computing hardware. In fact, within the last 20 years, the company had acquired some 40 companies. “From providing the plumbing, we have gone into the management and delivery of information. And today, we describe ourselves as an information infrastructure solution provider,” Leonard said.

While EMC is ensconced in its role as a major player in the storage sector, the challenge for the company is to re-align its brand without diminishing the tremendous value, built incrementally by the company over the last 30 years. “All the developments outlined obviously had a bearing on our brand management strategies. From working just with big companies, through time, we have extended our current offerings to individuals as well as small businesses,” he added.

Finally, employees play a vital role in the overall mix, Leonard emphasised, as they can be the company’s brand ambassadors. According to him, the company prides itself on creating an aura of success, pertaining to its business. There is also a strong internal culture where performance is rewarded. The company had, for instance, booked a Bali hotel for its top performers. The goal in its internal communications, he said, is to get its people to think of themselves as part of the winning team, a cut above others in the industry, and as people who work hard and deserve to be treated well. To that end, the company sums up on its website: “With EMC, people and organisations can bring the power of information to life”.