While HP was working out the details of its resolution with Abtech, the HP 3000 division was cutting off its supply of used HP 3000s to non-authorized resellers. Hewlett-Packard provides the vast majority of used systems to the 3000 marketplace, taking computers in trade ups or trade-ins and then moving them out to a waiting customer base. The auctioning of these systems to the used market had worked through the HP Equipment Management and Remarketing Division (EMRD), but no more. An April notice to resellers stated that “Beginning February, 1999, used HP 3000 servers are sold by HP only to end-user customers or to those parties having a valid contract for reselling the HP 3000 product line.” The contract refers to Phoenix 3000, a company HP said it has authorized in the US to “focus on the purchase, refurbishment, and resale of previously-owned HP 3000 computers. The goal of this company is to provide fully-licensed, warranted HP 3000s at an affordable price. Phoenix 3000 can supply used HP 3000 servers to either HP end user sales reps or HP 3000 distributors.”

Phoenix 3000 is being launched by Client Systems LLC, the Denver-based distributor of HP 3000s that focuses exclusively on the 3000 line. HP has said it will authorize other companies to act as these used 3000 resellers (see story in our main issue.) Meanwhile, non-authorized sources of HP 3000s will have to offer systems purchased directly from customers or from each other — so long as the other HP sources of used 3000s, like HP’s German and French operations, are also cut off from selling systems to the non-authorized used hardware brokers.