NTAP is beating its Gorilla chest with some lofty new leadership goals:
Network Appliance Sets Storage Networking Leadership Goal
Sunnyvale, CA - June 20, 2000 -- Network Appliance, Inc. (NASDAQ: NTAP), the leading provider of network-attached data access and content management solutions, today unveiled its goal to become the world leader in storage networking. Network Appliance is already the leader in the segment of storage networking known as network-attached storage (NAS). By announcing a combination of technologies, product initiatives, and industry partnerships, Network Appliance will expand its leadership to all facets of storage networking including direct attached storage and storage area networks (SAN).
"Distinctions among various storage networking technologies no longer matter," said Mark Santora, senior vice president of marketing at Network Appliance. "Network Appliance is changing the rules by making them simpler. If you want storage resources to be shared by various servers, deploy NetApp©?we have the products, solutions, and expertise to make your storage network powerful, scalable, and incredibly easy to deploy and manage."
Network Appliance brings two unique value propositions to this new, simpler storage networking paradigm: its storage appliances are powerful, easy to deploy and use, and highly scalable, unlike compute servers which are encumbered by heavy operating systems and myriad compute requests unrelated to data access and content management; and the company offers end-to-end solutions that span all the way from where data is stored (on filers) to where it is moved and received all over the Internet (using the company's NetCache? caching appliances.)
Additionally, Network Appliance is building its storage networking solutions around industry-standard approaches and encouraging broad industry participation in defining the future of storage networks.
Network Appliance is championing four technologies and approaches to realize its storage networking leadership goal:
Open Storage Networking, or OSN: Network Appliance formed OSN in May with Amdahl, Cisco Systems, Foundry Networks, Legato Systems, Quantum|ATL, and VERITAS Software. OSN is designed to define an open architecture and roadmap for continuous access and availability to data with best-in-class performance and industry-leading value. OSN also aims to accelerate the adoption of truly open storage networking solutions and further the maturity, management capability, and performance of current and future storage network architectures. Initial implementations of OSN are based on Gigabit and 10-Gigabit Ethernet technology, but OSN includes Fibre Channel and InfiniBand storage networking, as well.
Direct Access File System (DAFS) and the DAFS Collaborative: Network Appliance is working with Intel Corporation, Seagate Technology, and collaborative members on a new memory-to-memory protocol for direct file access that will dramatically enhance the performance of Internet, collaborative, e-commerce, and database applications within storage network environments. The protocol is designed to enable a new generation of high-performance, low-latency storage networks, establishing new levels of scalability, functionality, and ease of use demanded by today's nonstop computing environments and the staffs who create and support them. Network Appliance also formed the DAFS Collaborative to encourage broad support for an adoption of the new protocol and will host a DAFS Developers' Conference in summer, 2000. Finally, Network Appliance completed its acquisition of Orca Systems, Inc. on June 13, allowing it to quickly dedicate engineering resources to realize DAFS.
Network Data Management Protocol (NDMP): Network Appliance co-developed NDMP with Legato, and recently turned the protocol over to the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) for future standards development. NDMP provides a protocol framework for data management in a multivendor data server environment. By defining a network protocol that abstracts data management application functionality from data service providers, NDMP minimizes the administrative management logic that resides on data servers and allows interoperability with a variety of data management solutions.
Certified Shared Backup Solution: On February 2, 2000, Network Appliance announced the first-ever NAS and SAN combined storage solution, a Fibre Channel SAN-based shared tape backup system that supports Network Appliance? storage appliances, and is managed by enterprise data storage software. Network Appliance announced this industry first with Quantum|ATL, Spectra Logic Corporation, Legato, VERITAS Software, and Vixel Corporation. The integrated solution meets the demands of IT managers facing rapidly increasing amounts of storage, and delivers a new level of speed and performance while protecting customer investments. The standards-based solution addresses the demands of network storage customers seeking increased, LAN-free tape backup and sharing of valuable tape resources. The solution's infrastructure removes the backup traffic from the LAN, eliminating the backup disruption from end users and their applications. Connectivity dramatically increases as libraries and filers are now shared across the SAN.
The explosion of Internet computing, and the increased use of database, email, collaborative, and other information-intensive applications has propelled storage and content management to the fore of IT concerns. Working with other industry leaders and focusing on standards-based approaches that leverage customers' existing infrastructures while anticipating tremendous storage needs (in capacity, ease of use, scalability, and management) for the future, Network Appliance believes it is well-positioned to champion storage networking to the next level.
About Network Appliance
Network Appliance, a veteran in network file serving and caching, has been providing data access solutions since 1992 and is a member of both the S+P 500 and NASDAQ 100 index. Major corporations and ISPs, including Lycos, Yahoo!, Citicorp Securities, Siemens, Lockheed, Cisco, Motorola, and Texas Instruments have deployed NetApp solutions. NetApp Internet caching solutions (NetCache? appliances) and file servers ("filers") deliver fast, simple, reliable, and cost-effective access to network-stored data and enable simultaneous shared file services for UNIX©, Windows NT©, and the World Wide Web.
The company pioneered the concept of the "network appliance," an extension of the industry trend toward dedicated, specialized products that perform a single function. Network Appliance? filers and NetCache appliances are based on the company's innovative data access software known as the Data ONTAP? operating system and standards-compliant hardware.
Press Contacts:
Eric Brown (products)
Network Appliance, Inc.
(408) 822-3463
ebrown@netapp.com Adam Trunkey (corporate)
Network Appliance, Inc.
(408) 822-6314
atrunkey@netapp.com
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