STORAGE NETWORKING WORLD, PHOENIX, April 5, 2004 (PRIMEZONE) -- Emulex Corporation (NYSE:ELX), Seagate Technology (NYSE:STX) and Xyratex announced today that they will collectively display a new 4 Gb/s Fibre Channel storage solution at this week's Storage Networking World Spring 2004 conference. The live, fully interoperable solution is a result of the three companies' efforts to merge their respective 4 Gb/s technologies into an advanced, high performance storage enclosure called a "Switched Bunch Of Disks" (SBODTM), which brings 4 Gb/s Fibre Channel switched connectivity to each individual 4 Gb/s enterprise-class drive.
The demonstration will be displayed at both the Seagate and Emulex booths (booths P20 and P12 respectively) at the Spring 2004 Storage Networking World conference in Phoenix, AZ, which begins on April 5th, 2004.
Xyratex's industry leading 4 Gb/s storage enclosure technology, Seagate's Cheetah 4 Gb/s enterprise drives and Emulex's InSpeed(tm) SOC 422 4 Gb/s embedded storage switches combine to create a unique demonstration that will be ready for OEM testing, integration and deployment later in the year. This solution was first unveiled last month at the recent CeBit exposition in Hannover, Germany, where it was the storage industry's first live interoperable 4 Gb/s Fibre Channel technology demonstration.
To compliment this demonstration, Agilent, Infineon, Intel and JDS Uniphase have provided optical transceiver technologies as well as interoperability development and testing support.
SNW Spring 2004 Demonstration 4 Gb/s Storage Technologies and Participants
Seagate Technology: As the leading supplier of innovative storage products and interface technologies, Seagate's Fibre Channel family of disc drives are the storage standard for the largest enterprises. The 4 Gb/s demonstration consists of Seagate Cheetah disc drives in communication with both the Emulex and Xyratex solutions, and functioning with full interoperability.
"The 4 Gb/s Fibre Channel demonstration between Seagate, Emulex, and Xyratex highlights each company's commitment to work together to deliver fully interoperable, high-performance and high-reliability storage solutions for the most demanding enterprise environments," said Jeff Loebakka, Seagate Vice President of Global Product Marketing. "As enterprise information requirements continue to grow along with the need to increase system manageability, the use of 4 Gb/s Fibre Channel solutions as part of the primary I/O subsystem will be the ideal choice."
Emulex Corporation: Facilitating the switched back-end architecture in the demonstration, in an SBOD or "Switched Bunch of Disks" application, is Emulex's 4 Gb/s InSpeed SOC 422 Embedded Storage Switch. Emulex's award-winning InSpeed technology increases the RAS (Reliability, Availability and Serviceability) and performance characteristics of storage systems by bringing switched Fibre Channel connectivity into the storage array and down to the individual drive or shelf level. The InSpeed SOC 422, which was first announced in January 2004, is Emulex's third generation of InSpeed technology and incorporates SES management, Trunking and Fairness capabilities into a single, highly integrated chip.
"The InSpeed SOC 422 is presently being broadly tested for integration by leading OEMs, further underscoring that we will see a smooth transition to 4 Gb/s Fibre Channel technologies in 2005," said Mike Smith, Executive Vice President of Worldwide Marketing, Emulex Corporation. "As the 4 Gb/s solution we're demonstrating at SNW with Seagate and Xyratex reflects, Emulex is working with leading storage vendors to stay ahead of the curve in delivering 4 Gb/s technologies to customers."
Xyratex: Xyratex built this initial 4 Gb/s product using the successful 2 Gb/s enterprise class SBOD (Switched Bunch of Disks) storage enclosure. Optimizing the enclosure for 4 Gb/s operation required stringent control of signal integrity, jitter and noise tolerance. Integrated SBOD firmware already used on Xyratex's currently shipping 2 Gb/s SBOD solution has been utilized with the InSpeed SOC 422 device.
The three elements within this demonstration have enabled Xyratex to be one of the first enterprise class storage enclosure manufacturers to establish a 4 Gb/s technology base, demonstrating a continued commitment to advancing new technology boundaries for the benefit of our OEM customers.
"The 4 Gb/s storage solution originally demonstrated at CeBit and now on display at SNW goes well beyond a proof-of-concept," said Malcolm Muggeridge, CTO for Storage Systems Technology at Xyratex. "This live demonstration integrates products from three of the industry's 4 Gb/s leaders into a fully integrated storage system. Xyratex is proud to be part of the industry leadership."
About Xyratex
Xyratex is a leading provider of enterprise class data storage subsystems and network technology. We design and manufacture enabling technology that provides our OEM and disk drive manufacturer customers with data storage products to support high-performance storage and data communication networks.
Founded in 1994 in an MBO from IBM, and with headquarters in the UK, the company employs over 700 people with around a third working in R&D. Xyratex has an established global base with R&D and operational facilities in Europe, the United States and Southeast Asia. For further information about Xyratex storage products, please visit our website at www.xyratex.com, or contact your regional sales director.
About Seagate
Seagate is the worldwide leader in the design, manufacturing and marketing of hard disc drives, providing products for a wide range of Enterprise, PC, Notebook and Consumer Electronics applications. The Company is committed to delivering award-winning products, customer support and reliability, to meet the world's growing demand for information storage. Seagate can be found around the globe and at www.seagate.com.
Seagate, Seagate Technology, the WAVE logo and Cheetah are trademarks or registered trademarks of Seagate Technology LLC. All other trademarks or registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
About Emulex
Emulex Corporation is the world's largest supplier and developer of Fibre Channel host bus adapters and a leading provider of embedded storage technologies to the industry's top-tier storage and server manufacturers. Emulex was recently ranked number 15 in Deloitte & Touche's 2003 Technology Fast 50 and named one of Forbes Magazine's 25 Fastest Growing Technology Companies.
The Emulex award-winning product families, including its LightPulse(tm) HBAs and InSpeed(tm) embedded storage switching products, are based on internally developed ASIC, firmware and software technologies spanning both Fibre Channel and IP networking protocols, and offer customers high performance, scalability, flexibility and reduced total cost of ownership. The company's products have been selected by the world's leading server and storage providers, including Apple, Dell, EMC, Fujitsu Ltd., Fujitsu Siemens, Groupe Bull, HP, Hitachi Data Systems, IBM, NEC, Network Appliance, StorageTek, Sun Microsystems, Unisys and Xyratex. In addition, Emulex includes industry leaders Brocade, Computer Associates, Intel, McDATA, Microsoft and VERITAS among its strategic partners. Additionally, Emulex and Intel, via a joint development agreement, are pioneering the industry's first storage processors for Serial ATA, Serial Attached SCSI and Fibre Channel interfaces within a single architecture.
Emulex markets to OEMs and end users through its own worldwide selling organization, as well as its two-tier distribution partners, including ACAL, Avnet, Bell Microproducts, Info-X, Netmarks, Tech Data, TidalWire and Tokyo Electron. Corporate headquarters are located in Costa Mesa, California. News releases and other information about Emulex Corporation are available at http://www.emulex.com.
EMULEX -- We network storage
Emulex Safe Harbor Statement
"Safe Harbor" Statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: With the exception of historical information, the statements set forth above include forward-looking statements that involve risk and uncertainties. The company wishes to caution readers that a number of important factors could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements. Those factors include the rapidly changing nature of technology, evolving industry standards and frequent introductions of new products and enhancements by competitors; fluctuation in the growth of Fibre Channel and IP markets; changes in economic conditions or changes in end-user demand for technology solutions; fluctuations or delays in customer orders; the highly competitive nature of the markets for Emulex's products; Emulex's ability to gain market acceptance for its products; the company's ability to attract and retain skilled personnel; the company's reliance on third-party suppliers. These and other factors which could cause actual results to differ materially from those in the forward-looking statements are also discussed in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its recent filings on Forms 8-K, 10-K and 10-Q.
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