100 Million Hard Drives Sold: Bell Microproducts Sets Industry Benchmark

Low cost storage capacity remains in high demand – as evidenced by a recent benchmark set by Bell Microproducts Inc. (Nasdaq:BELM), one of the world's largest value-added distributors of storage and computing technology. Today, the company announced that it has reached the milestone of shipping 100 million hard disk drives (HDD) since its founding in 1987.

According to Bell Micro's president and CEO, Don Bell, strong customer relationships are one of the keys to the company's success: "Our customers are the key to our success, and the fact that they have purchased over 100 million HDDs from us over the years is a testament to their high confidence level in Bell Micro – and our ability to meet their needs. Achieving this milestone has truly been a global team effort – we have earned our strong market position through consistent execution over time."

This milestone was achieved by combining Bell Micro's global resources with our strong supplier relationships to solve the needs of our customers. Bell Micro is the predominant source of HDDs and represents all of the major manufacturers, including Hitachi, Samsung, Seagate, Toshiba and Western Digital.

"The rich digital world we live in today would not be possible without affordable, high capacity hard disk drive storage," states John Rydning, IDC's research director for hard disk drives. "Bell Micro's shipment of its 100 millionth HDD is a testament to the important role it plays in delivering HDD storage to customers around the world – for more than 20 years."

"A growing demand for digital storage capacity combined with more affordable technology continue to fuel demand for HDDs," noted Joe Cousins, vice president of marketing for Bell Micro. "In fact, we are back to above pre-recession levels in terms of total disk drives sold in the market and were able to reach the 100 million HDDs sold milestone ahead of the date which we had originally projected.  Moreover, Bell Micro's long standing reputation as a trusted storage partner positions us well as we strive towards the next milestone."

Bell noted that the company has the right support infrastructure, product lines, inventory, technical expertise and supply chain capabilities to continue as the leading global disk drive distributor. Reflecting upon the success of Bell Micro over the years, Bell commented that, "We are committed to continuing to support our customers in an excellent manner and providing them with the complete package for their storage needs, from design to deployment.  We have earned a strong position with our customers by doing this well over our 21 years in the disk drive industry. Together, Bell Micro, our customers, and supplier partners have proven to be a winning combination."

For more information, please visit www.bellmicro.com.

About Bell Microproducts Inc.

Bell Microproducts (Nasdaq:BELM) is an international, value-added distributor of a wide range of high-tech products, solutions and services, including storage systems, servers, software, computer components, and peripherals, as well as maintenance and professional services. An industry-recognized specialist in storage products, the company is one of the world's largest storage-centric value-added distributors.

Bell Microproducts is uniquely qualified with deep technical and application expertise to service a broad range of information technology needs. From design to deployment, its products are available at any level of integration, from components to subsystem assemblies and fully-integrated, tested and certified system solutions. More information can be found in the company's SEC filings, or by visiting the Bell Microproducts web site at www.bellmicro.com.

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