RS Components has added LeCroy oscilloscopes and serial data test systems to its test instrument linecard.
The "big" product for both LeCroy and RS will be the WaveAce series of dual-channel oscilloscopes offering 60MHz to 300MHz bandwidths and sample rates up to 2GS/s.
The WaveAce oscilloscopes range in price from £620 to £1,827 for the top of the range 300MHz instrument. So LeCroy is competing with the TDS2000B from Tektronix and DSO3000A from Agilent.
In August, RS added further Agilent lines to its catalogue.
Agilent has been ramping its distribution sales strategy this year and part of that was the launch of the mid-range 1000 series scopes in May.
The economic downturn has inevitably tightened budgets and it is likely that that lower cost instruments will become more important this year.
And it is in the area of low and mid-range scopes that the distribution channel could take on greater strategic importance.
"Our partnership with RS Components has developed immeasurably over the past year," said Alessandro Pino, European distribution sales manager for Agilent Technologies.
So it comes as no surprise that Agilent is looking to address this area of its business. It sells scopes through Farnell and Amplicon as well as RS.
Tektronix was the first of the big two test firms to use the distribution channel to widen the market and drive sales of entry level lower cost scopes and meters, in particular.
See blog: Agilent sees importance of distribution channel