Palatine, Ill. — Square D and Schneider North America revealed Jan. 21 they'll support all IBM real estate and site operations in the U.S. with electrical distribution, control, and automation solutions. This three-year agreement follows two years of development and six months of testing at IBM's northeastern U.S. facilities.

Square D and Schneider North America, which also includes Schneider Automation (North Andover, Mass.), will be IBM's first choice for all electrical solutions and business processes described in their agreement. IBM will buy and implement Square D and Schneider's electrical solutions for its U.S. manufacturing locations, data centers and other facilities and administrative offices. The agreement also covers OEM components that IBM incorporates into computer mainframes, disk drives, and other products.

During a Feb. 9 press event at IBM's semiconductor plant in Burlington, Vt., the companies added their agreement will be expanded to include IBM facilities in Canada and Mexico in 1Q99.

"Industry leaders such as IBM are looking for long-term benefits from their suppliers. They're looking beyond short-term, transaction-based gains and are focusing on what alliances can do to reduce their costs, improve their profitability, build customer satisfaction and strengthen their market leadership," says William Schaphorst, IBM's strategic account manager of the relationship with Square D and Schneider North America. "We're pleased that our two companies can now concentrate on product design and application, and new standards and processes that lower overall costs and improve efficiencies."

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