The only US distribution outpost for HP e3000 hardware is distributing a key element in the HP e-services push: a pair of Web sites that will link resellers with service providers, and customers with resellers.

Client Systems LLC, the exclusive North American distributor for e3000 systems, has formed a CSDev group within the company to create AgentDepot and AskTheDepot Web sites. HP is calling this element of its sales strategy Channels on Tap. In the latest version of HP’s channel, resellers and integrators become agents offering services — because HP wants all its business partners to think beyond sales of HP hardware.

HP calls Channels on Tap a “trusted marketplace portal ecosystem,” one that lets customers purchase hosted services through a reseller or integrator — the agent — who has access to a pre-qualified set of service providers. HP hopes the new business model will accelerate the evolution of its “software as a service” model. In the e3000 market, this model is represented by the Apps-on-Tap program.

CSDev is working on a contract to develop and manage two elements of Channels on Tap. In July it will launch the AgentDepot.com site, a place where HP’s 28,000 resellers can form partnerships with service providers. AskTheDepot.com is coming in the fall, according to Client Systems’ VP and general manager of CSDev Evan Westenskow. That portal will be a place where customers can locate a source for solutions: the combination of computer resources and services that employ HP server-based application software.

HP offered the opportunity to Client Systems “to enable the whole Application Service Provider infrastructure to actually work,” said CEO Pat Maley, “because of our two-tier distribution experience and our ability to build an Internet site.”

Establishing a portal for resellers is another step in HP’s efforts to manage cost of sales, Maley said. AgentDepot “is the HP sales organization managing the resellers, but doing it online rather than having a whole bunch of people running around the country. With alert systems and cell phones being the receptors of information, you can do some pretty sophisticated things that make a sales rep much more effective in selling a broad line of products.”

HP’s CEO Carly Fiorina has reorganized the sales force so it represents the full scope of HP’s products from every rep. The Depot will let customers purchase applications on a usage basis, with sales going to the small- and medium-sized businesses that are too costly to reach with face-to-face contact.

Application opportunities in the Depot that employ the e3000 will be far fewer in number than those of other platforms. Westenskow said that reflects the number of MPE/iX applications available.

“There’s not a lot [in it] for the e3000,” Westenskow said. “The platforms that will be hosting solutions will be MPE, Unix, Linux and NT. But because of the proliferation of software available in the hosted solution market, it will be highly Unix and NT — because that’s where the majority of the solutions are.”

Maley said that “some of the applications that can end up in this ASP suite over time could be 3000 applications,” including Smith-Gardner’s Ecometry and Summit Information System’s Spectrum credit union software.

CSDev’s mission is broader than the Client Systems mission of servicing the e3000 market in North America, so Westenskow said the group will eventually be a separate company. “We don’t want a diversion of that focus,” he said.

Until that organizational separation takes place, CSDev is sharing space with Client Systems. The new venture is creating a Web development team separate from Client System’s 3kworld.com portal development team.