Cloud storage hits the High Street

Carphone Warehouse will offer its customers Geek Squad-branded online storage services by Trend Micro.

The storage services will actually be provided by Spare Backup and will be embedded within a Trend Micro Internet Security PRO service, co-branded by TMI and Spare Backup as "Geek Squad".

Spare Backup and Trend have signed a Memorandum of Understanding about this. The MOU runs out after 45 days and their intention is to sign a Master Services Agreement governing the TMI-Spare Backup relationship for this Carphone deal.

Spare Backup will receive revenue as customers register for the online storage service on an undisclosed basis.

Geek Squad is actually a US-based home and small business IT support business, owned by Best Buy, with more than 15,000 agents in the USA. Its UK arm has had an agreement with Carphone since 2007 and Carphone offers Geek Squad-branded services to its customers, covering mobile phones, notebook computers, technical support and insurance aspects. The Carphone Geek Squad notebook package offers include an online backup option.

Through an agreement with Best Buy Europe Distributions Limited (BBE), in May this year, Spare Backup launched Geek Squad branded online data storage services in the U.K, saying at the time: "The service will be offered as an icon on the desktop on all PCs sold and included in a number of their support products... The initial launch in the UK will be at BBE's partner, The Carphone Warehouse Limited (CPW), which currently operates within nine countries in Europe." There may be the potential for the service to cross the channel into mainland Europe in the future.

Under the terms of that agreement Spare Backup will provide branded storage services to Geek Squad customers as an inclusive service, through a number of Geek Squad support products. Spare Backup will receive an annual payment from Carphone when a registered user exceeds 1GB of their online storage. Customers who have not purchased a Geek Squad support product are prompted to increase their storage capacity if they pass their 1GB limit. Spare Backup and Carphone have agreed to share revenue from the service.

Spare Backup previously announced an agreement with Carphone Warehouse for its cloud backup service to be offered to Carphone's customers, with the two suppliers sharing the customer revenue. ®