Storage Networking Leaders Announce Next Evolution Of Interoperability Initiatives Registered With SNIA
Announcement posted by Legato Systems Inc. 27 Mar 2002
Legato, Quantum, StorageTek and VERITAS Software join Brocade, Compaq, EMC, Hitachi Data Systems, IBM and McDATA to Provide Expanded Configurations for Multi-Vendor Interoperability
Six members of the Storage Networking Industry Associations Supported Solutions Forum (SNIA SSF) Brocade, Compaq Computer Corp., EMC, Hitachi Data Systems, IBM Corp. and McDATA Corp. today announced that SSF members Legato Systems, Inc., Quantum Corp., StorageTek and VERITAS Software have joined them to provide a new solution set that expands on the flexibility and functionality of the first cross-vendor, interoperable storage networking solutions registered and qualified with SNIA in June 2001.
This cooperation among competing vendors is a model approach to providing customers with interoperable, heterogeneous storage area network (SAN) solutions, said Marc Oswald, chairman of the SNIAs Supported Solutions Forum (SSF). These latest additions to the SSF Solutions Registry demonstrate the SSFs commitment to provide customers with SAN solutions that offer a broad choice of products and are cooperatively supported by the participating vendors.
The original solution set included joint qualification of two open storage area network solutions that enabled the coexistence of data zones containing Compaq, EMC, Hitachi Data Systems and IBM storage system products on a single, shared Fibre Channel fabric. At that time, participating vendors signed bilateral cooperative support agreements intended to simplify joint customer support in multi-vendor environments.
The new solution set adds additional backup capabilities and multi-vendor disk storage from Compaq, EMC, Hitachi Data Systems and IBM; multi-vendor tape storage from IBM, Quantum and StorageTek; and multi-vendor backup/recovery software from Legato Systems, Inc., IBM Tivoli Storage and VERITAS Software, all running on either a Brocade fabric or a McDATA fabric. The Brocade fabric consists of 12 Silkworm 2800 16-port switches at its edge with four SilkWorm 3800 16-port switches at its core. The core switches utilize the higher speed 2 Gb/sec link technology, while the edge switches use 1 Gb/sec link technology. The McDATA fabric consists of four 64-port Intrepid 6000 Series Directors plus a single Sphereon 1000 Series Edge Switch for attaching FC-AL tape drives. The McDATA Director uses 1 Gb/sec technology that is supported and upgradeable to 2 Gb/sec to 10 Gb/sec, while the Edge Switch uses 1Gb/sec link technology.
This is a strategic step forward in the evolution of cooperatively supported, open SAN interoperability sponsored by SNIA and the SSF, said SNIA Board Member Clod Barrera. These industry leaders are working together to develop solutions that truly benefit end users and solve real world business problems.
Open SAN Solutions
Open SAN solutions are standards-based storage networks that provide tested interoperability of products supplied by multiple vendors. Potential benefits include increased flexibility for networked storage infrastructures, reduced costs from consolidating SAN islands, greater investment protection and maximized value of storage networking technology. Storage networking customers are able to deploy heterogeneous SANs from multiple suppliers with interoperability and improved support.
Customer Support
In January 2002, the SSF announced collaboration with the Technical Support Alliance Network (TSANet) to utilize its multi-vendor support process to administer a 24x7 cooperative support relationship capability for the SNIA SSF. This relationship provides the means for SNIA members to work together to support their mutual customers, eliminating potential finger pointing amongst vendors when a customer needs support. The customers ability to engage cooperative support is dependent upon the customer having valid support, warranty or service agreements with each vendor in any interoperable solution and in no way provides an additional level of entitlement to the customer. Through this tightly coupled cooperative support relationship, a customer can rest assured that their multi-vendor support issues are addressed appropriately.
The overall framework of these interoperability initiatives enables SNIA members to offer customer-friendly support while at the same time allowing them to preserve the healthy competition that marks the storage network marketplace.
Next Steps
The SSF will continue the development of interoperable storage initiatives by expanding the size of configurations, involving additional vendors, adding components, increasing the level of component interoperability, adding multi-vendor switch interoperability and integrating new storage networking applications.
For more information, visit the SNIA Web site at www.snia.org.
About Brocade Communications Systems, Inc.
Brocade (NASDAQ:BRCD) offers the industrys leading intelligent platform for networking storage. The worlds leading systems, applications and storage vendors have selected Brocade to provide a networking foundation for their SAN solutions. The Brocade SilkWorm family of fabric switches and software is designed to optimize data availability and storage and server resources in the enterprise. Using Brocade solutions, companies can simplify the implementation of storage area network, reduce the total cost of ownership of data storage environments, and improve network and application efficiency. For more information, visit the Brocade web site at www.brocade.com or contact the company at info@brocade.com.
About Compaqs StorageWorks
Compaqs (NYSE:CPQ) StorageWorks, the number one global storage solutions supplier, is the leader in the development and delivery of the enterprise SAN. Recognized for its vision and ability to execute, StorageWorks is committed to driving radical simplification and investment protection for enterprise and SMB customers. By continuing to extend its Enterprise Network Storage Architecture (ENSA) in key areas such as virtualization, automation, universal network storage and life cycle data management, DataWorks enables customers to efficiently manage complex, mixed storage environments. More information on StorageWorks and SAN work solutions is available at www.compaq.com/storage.
About EMC Corporation
EMC Corporation (NYSE:EMC) is the world leader in information storage systems, software, networks and services, providing the information infrastructure for a connected world. Information about EMC's products and services can be found at www.EMC.com.
About Hitachi Data Systems
Hitachi Data Systems, the fastest growing enterprise storage provider, is a leading supplier of storage hardware, software, solutions and services. As a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE: HIT), Japan's largest electronics company, HDS is committed to providing the storage infrastructure for the world's most information-intensive corporations. With 2,600 employees, Hitachi Data Systems does business through direct sales and resellers in the public and private sectors in 170 countries on six continents. Its customers include more than 50 percent of Fortune 100 companies.). For more information, please visit our Web site at www.hds.com.
About IBM
IBM is the world leader in storage systems, software, services and technology. The recipient of the Year 2000 National Medal of Technology for its contributions to hard disk drive and storage technology, IBM led all companies once again with U.S. patents in 2001. IBM's open storage solutions are designed for the rigors of e-business collaboration utilizing next generation concepts for open storage by integrating modular technologies including disk, tape, storage networking and optical storage media, powerful processors, and rich software. For more information about the products and enhancements announced today, visit www.ibm.com/totalstorage.
About IBM Tivoli Software
Tivoli Software from IBM is designed to help IT organizations reduce the total cost of ownership and improve service levels of the IT infrastructure. Tivoli systems management software helps traditional enterprises and e-businesses worldwide manage security, storage, performance and availability, and configuration and operations. Backed by world-class IBM services, support and research, Tivoli software is one of four key IBM Software Group brands DB2, Lotus, Tivoli and WebSphere. For more information, visit www.tivoli.com.
About Legato Systems, Inc.
Legato Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:LGTO) delivers worldwide enterprise class software solutions and services that keep the world's business-critical information and applications available. With a direct sales force and through strategic partnerships and alliances, Legato delivers the advantage of business continuance through enterprise automation with information protection, application availability and storage management solutions. The company's corporate headquarters are located at 2350 West El Camino Real, Mountain View, CA 94040 (650) 210-7000, fax: (650) 210-7032, Web site: www.legato.com.
About McDATA Corporation
McDATA (NASDAQ:MCDTA/MCDT) is the worldwide leader in open storage networking solutions and provides highly available, scalable and centrally managed storage area networks (SANs) that address enterprise-wide storage problems. McDATA's core-to-edge enterprise SAN solutions improve the reliability and availability of data to simplify SAN management and reduce the total cost of ownership. McDATA extensively pre-tests its solutions to provide IT organizations with the comprehensive tools, methodologies and support essential to robust SAN implementation. McDATA distributes its products through its OEMs, network of resellers and Elite Solution Partners. For more information, visit the McDATA Web site at www.mcdata.com.
About Quantum Corporation
Quantum Corp. (NYSE:DSS), founded in 1980, is a global leader in data protection and network storage systems, meeting the needs of business customers with enterprise-wide storage solutions and services. Quantum is the world's largest supplier of tape drives, and its DLTtapeTM technology is the de facto standard for backup, archiving, and recovery of mission-critical data. Quantum is a leader in the design, manufacture and service of automated tape libraries used to manage, store and transfer data. In addition to having the largest installed base of Network Attached Storage (NAS) appliances of any NAS supplier, Quantum is the leader in the workgroup NAS market category. Quantum sales for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2001, were approximately $1.4 billion. Quantum Corp., 501 Sycamore Dr., Milpitas, CA 95035, (408) 944-4000, www.quantum.com
About the SNIA
The Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) is a not-for-profit organization, made up of more than 300 companies and individuals worldwide spanning the entire storage industry. SNIA members share a common goal: to set the pace of the industry by ensuring that storage networks become efficient, complete and trusted solutions across the IT community. To this end the SNIA is uniquely committed to delivering standards, education and services that will propel open storage networking solutions into the broader market. For more information, contact the SNIA at (650) 949-6720 or via e-mail at executivedirector@snia.org, or visit the SNIA Web site at www.snia.org.
About the SNIA Supported Solutions Forum
The Supported Solutions Forum (SSF) is a group of companies within the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) that promotes customer adoption of open storage networking solutions by encouraging vendors to work together and deliver to customers mutually supported, interoperable solutions. In support of the SNIA goals, the highly innovative SSF was established in June of 2001, so that SNIA members could improve storage networking interoperability through solutions jointly developed and qualified by Forum members. Each solution is cooperatively supported by sponsoring Forum members to provide a streamlined customer support process for the end-user company. For the full list of available solutions, visit the SSF Solutions Registry at www.snia.org/ssf.
About StorageTek
StorageTek (NYSE:STK), a $2 billion worldwide company with headquarters in Louisville, Colo., delivers a broad range of storage solutions for digitized data. StorageTek solutions are easy to manage and allow universal access to data across servers, media types and storage networks. StorageTek is the innovator and global leader in virtual storage solutions for tape automation, disk storage systems and storage networking and is a voting member of the SNIA. Because of StorageTek, customers can manage and leverage their digital assets as their businesses grow and can maximize IT productivity to ensure enterprise-class business continuity. For more information, see www.storagetek.com, or call 1-800-786-7835.
About TSANet
Founded in 1993, TSANet (Technical Support Alliance Network) is a worldwide, multi-vendor alliance that offers an industry-wide forum to facilitate servicing multi-vendor customers and provides an infrastructure for more efficient multi-vendor problem solving. Membership consists of more than one hundred software and hardware companies. TSANet can be reached at (913) 345-9311 or www.tsanet.org.
About VERITAS Software
VERITAS Software Corporation (Nasdaq: VRTS) is the leading provider of storage management software for data protection, disaster recovery, storage virtualization, storage area networks and application availability. More than 86 percent of Fortune 500 companies rely on VERITAS Softwares solutions for interoperability across diverse applications, servers, hardware, and storage appliances. With 5,600+ employees in 33 countries and revenues of $1.5 billion in 2001, VERITAS Software ranks among the top 10 software companies in the world. The company's corporate headquarters is located at 350 Ellis Street, Mountain View, CA 94043. (650) 527-8000, fax: (650) 527-8050, e-mail: vx-sales@veritas.com, Web site: www.veritas.com.
This cooperation among competing vendors is a model approach to providing customers with interoperable, heterogeneous storage area network (SAN) solutions, said Marc Oswald, chairman of the SNIAs Supported Solutions Forum (SSF). These latest additions to the SSF Solutions Registry demonstrate the SSFs commitment to provide customers with SAN solutions that offer a broad choice of products and are cooperatively supported by the participating vendors.
The original solution set included joint qualification of two open storage area network solutions that enabled the coexistence of data zones containing Compaq, EMC, Hitachi Data Systems and IBM storage system products on a single, shared Fibre Channel fabric. At that time, participating vendors signed bilateral cooperative support agreements intended to simplify joint customer support in multi-vendor environments.
The new solution set adds additional backup capabilities and multi-vendor disk storage from Compaq, EMC, Hitachi Data Systems and IBM; multi-vendor tape storage from IBM, Quantum and StorageTek; and multi-vendor backup/recovery software from Legato Systems, Inc., IBM Tivoli Storage and VERITAS Software, all running on either a Brocade fabric or a McDATA fabric. The Brocade fabric consists of 12 Silkworm 2800 16-port switches at its edge with four SilkWorm 3800 16-port switches at its core. The core switches utilize the higher speed 2 Gb/sec link technology, while the edge switches use 1 Gb/sec link technology. The McDATA fabric consists of four 64-port Intrepid 6000 Series Directors plus a single Sphereon 1000 Series Edge Switch for attaching FC-AL tape drives. The McDATA Director uses 1 Gb/sec technology that is supported and upgradeable to 2 Gb/sec to 10 Gb/sec, while the Edge Switch uses 1Gb/sec link technology.
This is a strategic step forward in the evolution of cooperatively supported, open SAN interoperability sponsored by SNIA and the SSF, said SNIA Board Member Clod Barrera. These industry leaders are working together to develop solutions that truly benefit end users and solve real world business problems.
Open SAN Solutions
Open SAN solutions are standards-based storage networks that provide tested interoperability of products supplied by multiple vendors. Potential benefits include increased flexibility for networked storage infrastructures, reduced costs from consolidating SAN islands, greater investment protection and maximized value of storage networking technology. Storage networking customers are able to deploy heterogeneous SANs from multiple suppliers with interoperability and improved support.
Customer Support
In January 2002, the SSF announced collaboration with the Technical Support Alliance Network (TSANet) to utilize its multi-vendor support process to administer a 24x7 cooperative support relationship capability for the SNIA SSF. This relationship provides the means for SNIA members to work together to support their mutual customers, eliminating potential finger pointing amongst vendors when a customer needs support. The customers ability to engage cooperative support is dependent upon the customer having valid support, warranty or service agreements with each vendor in any interoperable solution and in no way provides an additional level of entitlement to the customer. Through this tightly coupled cooperative support relationship, a customer can rest assured that their multi-vendor support issues are addressed appropriately.
The overall framework of these interoperability initiatives enables SNIA members to offer customer-friendly support while at the same time allowing them to preserve the healthy competition that marks the storage network marketplace.
Next Steps
The SSF will continue the development of interoperable storage initiatives by expanding the size of configurations, involving additional vendors, adding components, increasing the level of component interoperability, adding multi-vendor switch interoperability and integrating new storage networking applications.
For more information, visit the SNIA Web site at www.snia.org.
About Brocade Communications Systems, Inc.
Brocade (NASDAQ:BRCD) offers the industrys leading intelligent platform for networking storage. The worlds leading systems, applications and storage vendors have selected Brocade to provide a networking foundation for their SAN solutions. The Brocade SilkWorm family of fabric switches and software is designed to optimize data availability and storage and server resources in the enterprise. Using Brocade solutions, companies can simplify the implementation of storage area network, reduce the total cost of ownership of data storage environments, and improve network and application efficiency. For more information, visit the Brocade web site at www.brocade.com or contact the company at info@brocade.com.
About Compaqs StorageWorks
Compaqs (NYSE:CPQ) StorageWorks, the number one global storage solutions supplier, is the leader in the development and delivery of the enterprise SAN. Recognized for its vision and ability to execute, StorageWorks is committed to driving radical simplification and investment protection for enterprise and SMB customers. By continuing to extend its Enterprise Network Storage Architecture (ENSA) in key areas such as virtualization, automation, universal network storage and life cycle data management, DataWorks enables customers to efficiently manage complex, mixed storage environments. More information on StorageWorks and SAN work solutions is available at www.compaq.com/storage.
About EMC Corporation
EMC Corporation (NYSE:EMC) is the world leader in information storage systems, software, networks and services, providing the information infrastructure for a connected world. Information about EMC's products and services can be found at www.EMC.com.
About Hitachi Data Systems
Hitachi Data Systems, the fastest growing enterprise storage provider, is a leading supplier of storage hardware, software, solutions and services. As a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd. (NYSE: HIT), Japan's largest electronics company, HDS is committed to providing the storage infrastructure for the world's most information-intensive corporations. With 2,600 employees, Hitachi Data Systems does business through direct sales and resellers in the public and private sectors in 170 countries on six continents. Its customers include more than 50 percent of Fortune 100 companies.). For more information, please visit our Web site at www.hds.com.
About IBM
IBM is the world leader in storage systems, software, services and technology. The recipient of the Year 2000 National Medal of Technology for its contributions to hard disk drive and storage technology, IBM led all companies once again with U.S. patents in 2001. IBM's open storage solutions are designed for the rigors of e-business collaboration utilizing next generation concepts for open storage by integrating modular technologies including disk, tape, storage networking and optical storage media, powerful processors, and rich software. For more information about the products and enhancements announced today, visit www.ibm.com/totalstorage.
About IBM Tivoli Software
Tivoli Software from IBM is designed to help IT organizations reduce the total cost of ownership and improve service levels of the IT infrastructure. Tivoli systems management software helps traditional enterprises and e-businesses worldwide manage security, storage, performance and availability, and configuration and operations. Backed by world-class IBM services, support and research, Tivoli software is one of four key IBM Software Group brands DB2, Lotus, Tivoli and WebSphere. For more information, visit www.tivoli.com.
About Legato Systems, Inc.
Legato Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:LGTO) delivers worldwide enterprise class software solutions and services that keep the world's business-critical information and applications available. With a direct sales force and through strategic partnerships and alliances, Legato delivers the advantage of business continuance through enterprise automation with information protection, application availability and storage management solutions. The company's corporate headquarters are located at 2350 West El Camino Real, Mountain View, CA 94040 (650) 210-7000, fax: (650) 210-7032, Web site: www.legato.com.
About McDATA Corporation
McDATA (NASDAQ:MCDTA/MCDT) is the worldwide leader in open storage networking solutions and provides highly available, scalable and centrally managed storage area networks (SANs) that address enterprise-wide storage problems. McDATA's core-to-edge enterprise SAN solutions improve the reliability and availability of data to simplify SAN management and reduce the total cost of ownership. McDATA extensively pre-tests its solutions to provide IT organizations with the comprehensive tools, methodologies and support essential to robust SAN implementation. McDATA distributes its products through its OEMs, network of resellers and Elite Solution Partners. For more information, visit the McDATA Web site at www.mcdata.com.
About Quantum Corporation
Quantum Corp. (NYSE:DSS), founded in 1980, is a global leader in data protection and network storage systems, meeting the needs of business customers with enterprise-wide storage solutions and services. Quantum is the world's largest supplier of tape drives, and its DLTtapeTM technology is the de facto standard for backup, archiving, and recovery of mission-critical data. Quantum is a leader in the design, manufacture and service of automated tape libraries used to manage, store and transfer data. In addition to having the largest installed base of Network Attached Storage (NAS) appliances of any NAS supplier, Quantum is the leader in the workgroup NAS market category. Quantum sales for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2001, were approximately $1.4 billion. Quantum Corp., 501 Sycamore Dr., Milpitas, CA 95035, (408) 944-4000, www.quantum.com
About the SNIA
The Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) is a not-for-profit organization, made up of more than 300 companies and individuals worldwide spanning the entire storage industry. SNIA members share a common goal: to set the pace of the industry by ensuring that storage networks become efficient, complete and trusted solutions across the IT community. To this end the SNIA is uniquely committed to delivering standards, education and services that will propel open storage networking solutions into the broader market. For more information, contact the SNIA at (650) 949-6720 or via e-mail at executivedirector@snia.org, or visit the SNIA Web site at www.snia.org.
About the SNIA Supported Solutions Forum
The Supported Solutions Forum (SSF) is a group of companies within the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) that promotes customer adoption of open storage networking solutions by encouraging vendors to work together and deliver to customers mutually supported, interoperable solutions. In support of the SNIA goals, the highly innovative SSF was established in June of 2001, so that SNIA members could improve storage networking interoperability through solutions jointly developed and qualified by Forum members. Each solution is cooperatively supported by sponsoring Forum members to provide a streamlined customer support process for the end-user company. For the full list of available solutions, visit the SSF Solutions Registry at www.snia.org/ssf.
About StorageTek
StorageTek (NYSE:STK), a $2 billion worldwide company with headquarters in Louisville, Colo., delivers a broad range of storage solutions for digitized data. StorageTek solutions are easy to manage and allow universal access to data across servers, media types and storage networks. StorageTek is the innovator and global leader in virtual storage solutions for tape automation, disk storage systems and storage networking and is a voting member of the SNIA. Because of StorageTek, customers can manage and leverage their digital assets as their businesses grow and can maximize IT productivity to ensure enterprise-class business continuity. For more information, see www.storagetek.com, or call 1-800-786-7835.
About TSANet
Founded in 1993, TSANet (Technical Support Alliance Network) is a worldwide, multi-vendor alliance that offers an industry-wide forum to facilitate servicing multi-vendor customers and provides an infrastructure for more efficient multi-vendor problem solving. Membership consists of more than one hundred software and hardware companies. TSANet can be reached at (913) 345-9311 or www.tsanet.org.
About VERITAS Software
VERITAS Software Corporation (Nasdaq: VRTS) is the leading provider of storage management software for data protection, disaster recovery, storage virtualization, storage area networks and application availability. More than 86 percent of Fortune 500 companies rely on VERITAS Softwares solutions for interoperability across diverse applications, servers, hardware, and storage appliances. With 5,600+ employees in 33 countries and revenues of $1.5 billion in 2001, VERITAS Software ranks among the top 10 software companies in the world. The company's corporate headquarters is located at 350 Ellis Street, Mountain View, CA 94043. (650) 527-8000, fax: (650) 527-8050, e-mail: vx-sales@veritas.com, Web site: www.veritas.com.