Some indirect feedback on CMNT's products used
in conjunction with EMC's SRDF, which is the
platinum standard for data mirroring with more
than 7,000 licensed sites. SRDF over IP,
which is based on CMNT's SAN over WAN
technology is expected to be a big hit as the
number of all-IP networks expand. As a point
of reference, Nortel's product developement is
geared towards 60% of the carriers who have
legacy issues and 40% of the carriers who
don't have legacy issues.
Findings:
Statements validating that EMC Symmetrix Enterprise
Storage provides the best fault tolerant solutions
were made by several of our group.
Max Lakritz of Stamps.com said:
"Utilizing EMC software we are able to centrally
manage our storage throughout the enterprise over
multiple geographic locations."
Barry Aronoff, of FutureLink described how EMC
SRDF (Symmetrix Remote Data Facility) is used at
FutureLink to support four geographically dispersed
data centers. He said:
"We picked EMC because of the data replication
features. It represented unique functionality that
we couldn’t find in other solutions."
Fred Seaman of Buy.com concurred:
"Geographical replication of the most critical
data, I don’t know of anyone else’s tool products
that will do that. That’s really important to
anyone for whom the store is electronic. When a
major retailer closes a store they may lose
1/500th of their business, if we close the store
we loose 100% of our business.” I can’t afford to
have that happen."
Note: Remote data replication and engineered
product redundancy (discussed earlier) are key
base technologies for disaster tolerant solutions.
EMC Symmetrix’s typical deployment as mirrored
disk array pairs removes one major nightmare that
system administrators have from the equation –
system restore in the case of catastrophic failure.
The ability to fail over quickly to an alternative
storage system containing the same content can save
a company many tens of thousands of dollars in
lost revenue, plus additional costs in lost follow
up business. Together these cascading effects can
add up to millions of dollars. In many cases, this
factor is part of the design specification of the
storage network.
Fred Seaman of Buy.com told us:
"We have geographically dispersed data centers
3000 miles away. I can’t restore it; I can’t
put tapes in fast enough. With mirrors between
different data centers I have a disaster
scenario where I have a sub-30 minute response
time for recovery of my transactions, as well
as disaster recovery for things that have a
much bigger window such as my accounting
center." Seaman’s continued "From the
standpoint of data availability in the event of
a disaster, I’m going to use all the EMC
features to make sure that all of my data is
there. I’m going to have mirrors at each data
center so that if something happens to a set of
drives my data is still available. I’m going to
mirror across data centers so that if something
happens to an entire data center I’m still in
business."
emc.com
Here's an interesting timeline that provides an idea of how CMNT's product development cycles and Swiss-type vendor-neutrality produce the most interesting alliances:
1997 EMC certifies CMNT for SRDF
CNT provides high-performance data channel connectivity over unlimited distance networks, supporting interfaces such as SCSI, T1/E1, T3/E3, ATM, and ESCON. The company has been a leader in the channel extension market since 1983. Strength in high-speed, long-distance communication has led the company to a leadership position in the storage area network (SAN) market, focusing on applications such as disk mirroring. In 1997, CNT became certified by EMC for its SRDF applications. Since then, it has leveraged its expertise in high-speed, long-distance data movement to support SRDF over a variety of network infrastructures.
cnt.com
5/10/1999 EMC and CMNT forge Marketing, Support and Service Alliance
The combination of EMC’s Symmetrix Remote Data Facility (SRDF) software and the proven mission-critical, wide-area networking capabilities of CNT’s UltraNet and Channelink products, means customers are able to cost-effectively and instantly transfer their EMC Enterprise Storage system-based information over extended distances to achieve the highest levels of management, protection and sharing. As a component of an EMC Enterprise Storage Network (ESN), information from dozens of Windows NT servers, UNIX servers and mainframes can be mirrored simultaneously, an ideal solution for high availability requirements and disaster recovery applications.
cnt.com
10/13/1999 CMNT announces the UltraNet Open Systems Gateway
Computer Network Technology (CNT®) today introduced its UltraNet Open Systems Gateway, the first storage area network (SAN) solution to support Fibre Channel over wide area networks (WANs). Fibre Channel technology, which is limited to 10 kilometers (6.2 miles), is sufficient for most local and campus SAN requirements, but companies with national or global entities need to replicate and share data corporate-wide. Using the UltraNet Open Systems Gateway, companies can create Storage WANs that enable them to link their application servers with storage located anywhere, creating a truly shared and secure resource that businesses can leverage to improve operations, deliver new applications, and create competitive advantage.
cnt.com
2/7/2000 EMC and CMNT announce SRDF over IP
SRDF Over IP is the product of a technology alliance between EMC and CNT Corporation (www.cnt.com), of Minneapolis, Minn., a leader in storage networking. CNT's UltraNet Storage Director is a vital element of the new SRDF offering. Working together, EMC and CNT developed the communication component and software that convert SRDF data frames to standard IP packets.
Available today, SRDF Over IP operates between local and remote Symmetrix systems using the ESCON protocol connected by private IP networks, intranets or Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) from Internet Service Providers (ISPs).
emc.com
5/8/2000 CMNT and McDATA
Computer Network Technology and McDATA Corporation, leading storage area network (SAN) companies, today announced they have completed interoperability testing between the CNT UltraNet Open Systems Gateway and the McDATA ED-5000 Director for Fibre Channel over ATM connectivity. Additionally, CNT has joined McDATA’s FabricReady Program as its first WAN connectivity partner. McDATA’s FabricReady Program is designed to help partners bring pre-tested SAN solutions to the storage marketplace. Together, McDATA and CNT can now offer customers the ability to connect mission-critical SANs over wide area networks (WANs) – the most efficient and effective method of leveraging storage investments for essential e-business and business continuance strategies.
cnt.com
July 2000 EMC and Nortel MOU (Memorandum of Understanding)
In 1999, EMC and Nortel Networks initiated an alliance centered around "Optical Interconnecting Storage." At the same time, engineering organizations from both companies began collaboration to identify and resolve technical issues relating to interoperability between EMC storage devices and protocols and Nortel Networks metro DWDM systems. This relationship began to take on a broader business perspective when the companies initiated engagement with joint customers to discuss product interoperability. As a result of this discussion, these key joint customers have become a source for cooperative management, technical support, and input.
In addition, executives from both companies discussed possibilities to work together more expansively. This resulted in the realization that optics and storage were quickly converging, and that a synergistic and cooperative approach to the market would enhance their abilities to capture the opportunity created by this convergence. The companies therefore decided to forge a formal relationship.
In July, 2000, Nortel Networks and EMC formalized their relationship with the execution of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). The MOU establishes the vision, partnering principles and key initiatives that will be pursued by the parties. In addition to Nortel's optical enablement of EMC's ESN technologies, Nortel Networks and EMC intend to collaborate in key technology integration and go to market programs to leverage each other's core strengths and competencies.
Message 14447732
7/10/2000 CMNT and Nortel
.....Until now, IP networks have been inadequate to handle the quality of service, the data security needs or the bandwidth-on-demand needs of storage applications. CNT has developed a transport protocol that provides enhanced storage application reliability on a standard IP backbone, along with data compression, alternate routing, load balancing, and enhanced flow control. This storage transport protocol is currently being used to facilitate SAN extensions over long distances, enabling key applications such as distance mirroring, tape backup, and storage distribution.
CNT and Nortel Networks will work towards the standardization of these innovations by submissions to the appropriate standards committees, including the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), and the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) T11 working group for consideration as an extension to the FCBB (Fibre Channel Back-Bone) standard.
siliconinvestor.com
9/21/2000 SPO Prospectus
EMC
We have established a relationship with EMC for remote disk mirroring applications. This existing relationship was recently enhanced by an agreement to provide an exclusive package of remote disk mirroring hardware, software and implementation service. We are offering an exclusive package of our hardware, software and implementation services to EMC's customers. Together with EMC, we offer omplementary professional services and linked customer support organizations. We work with EMC to provide our mutual customers with timely, effective service. For the six months ended July 31, 2000, sales of our storage networking products to customers using EMC's disk mirroring systems accounted for 26% of our total product revenue. In the year ended December 31, 1999, sales of our storage networking products to customers using EMC's disk mirroring systems accounted for 35% of our total product revenue. We also market our remote disk mirroring applications with other vendors, including Hitachi Data Systems and IBM.
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