CNT to Resell McDATA's Fibre Channel Connectivity Products
Partnership Ensures Enterprise-Strength Solutions to Drive Results for Storage Networking Customers
MINNEAPOLIS and BROOMFIELD, Colo., March 8 /PRNewswire/ -- McDATA Corporation (Nasdaq: MCDT - news, MCDTA - news), the global leader in open storage networking solutions and CNT (Nasdaq: CMNT - news), the global specialist in storage networking offering consultation, design, validation and implementation of enterprise storage area networks (SANs), announced today that CNT will resell McDATA's complete enterprise-to-edge line of Fibre Channel connectivity products to its customers and prospects worldwide. The reseller agreement will expand the scope of both CNT and McDATA's customer base while providing customers full-service, integrated, enterprise-wide SAN solutions.
McDATA's highly available and scalable SAN solutions offers CNT a complete portfolio of products in order to better meet the needs of its customers, ranging from Fortune 100 to mid-tier organizations. CNT's dedicated SAN services team provides customers with complete assessment, design and implementation services for multi-vendor SANs. As an OpenReady partner and part of the reseller agreement, CNT and McDATA have invested in providing technology to both companies' SAN solution labs to ensure interoperability between the CNT UltraNet and McDATA products.
``CNT provides the 'know-how' to make SANs work through our technology expertise, our multi-platform and multi-vendor approach, and years of real-world experience in designing and implementing storage networks,'' said Gary Johnson, vice president of storage networking services at CNT. ``Our passion -- to provide the best possible products and services to SAN clients -- is behind our decision to build partnerships with fellow leading SAN solution providers, such as McDATA, that enable us to deliver complete storage networking solutions that drive superior business results for our customers.''
CNT will become a McDATA Elite Solutions Partner and an OpenReady partner, providing CNT with access to McDATA's advanced Systems Integration Lab and SAN methodologies, as well as strengthening the vendors' working relationship for certification.
``As clients migrate from server-centric to storage-centric environments, they require the flexibility to grow their enterprise,'' said Mike Gustafson, vice president of worldwide sales at McDATA. ``Combining McDATA's technology leadership with CNT's ability to execute in the sales and consulting service arena greatly expands both the opportunities and the scope of our respective customer bases. Companies demand the ability to grow their current environment to meet future needs, fully leveraging their investments. Partnering with companies like CNT enables McData to expand its enterprise-to- edge SAN strategy and bring our solutions to a broader range of customers. The relationship also enables customers to take advantage of both the McDATA and CNT SAN consulting methodologies.''
``No other company can match CNT's depth and ability to deliver solutions with all major storage networking protocols, including Fibre Channel, ATM, ESCON, SCSI and IP. We look forward to deploying McDATA's world-class products within these enterprise storage networks,'' said CNT's Johnson.
The OpenReady solution agreement, focusing on Enterprise Tape Backup/Restore, will increase CNT's ability to provide customers with a complete end-to-end SAN solution while leveraging its international sales and professional service forces. McDATA's and CNT's lab-to-lab relationship will provide customers with certified solutions over extended distances using CNT's UltraNet® products.
``CNT's thorough, non-biased approach and its unmatched expertise has received rave reviews in the industry,'' said Gustafson. ``Since McDATA's product line is highly complementary to CNT's product offering, this agreement will allow us to develop additional solutions for the future.''
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