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Technology Stocks : Brocade Communications Systems,Inc. (Nasdaq-BRCD) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (1330)	1/20/2003 7:52:04 PM
From: E_K_S	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1583

Here is another article regarding the HP event in Amsterdam. Proliant blades lead HP charge 16:01 Monday 20th January 2003 Peter Judge (http://news.zdnet.co.uk/story/0,,t269-s2128994,00.html) From the article:"...The company promised "architectural framework for intelligent virtualisation of storage on existing network fabric" jointly with Brocade...." <Sounds like a partnership arrangement to me for now. Remember HP is already a reseller of Brocade products and services and is a Master licensee of Brocade's switch software. I suspect HP has agreed to use Brocade's Rhapsody intellectual property for their new VSAN product and will help configure, support and sell it when it becomes available. Since HP is willing to announce it at their conference, they must like what they see. From what I have read, the intelligent switch is primarily an embedded software component controlled by a high level software utility. There is really no need for an OEM product to be manufactured because it is all software, therefore the new Brocade/Rhapsody product/service can be licensed directly to HP. Brocade would probably charge HP a one time or multi-year license fee as well as some sort of per customer site fee split between HP and Brocade. Sometimes these agreements have minimum royalty fee committments and can be structured to provide a reduced customer site royalty based on volume. Finally, they may have to (jointly) develop a universal controller card that provides the embedded software code for the older legacy fabric switches that do not have on board FPGAs.> What I find interesting is they actually demonstrated a working design using Microsoft's Volume ShadowCopy Services (VSS) now available in Windows Server 2003. However MSF did not announce any other services or features in their OS that specifically manages VSAN enterprise. This will be something to look for in the future. "...One highlight of the show is a multi-vendor storage area network (SAN) believed to be the world's largest, with 1,000 Fibre Channel ports, 15 different kinds of server and 10 operating systems. This will include the first live demonstration of Microsoft's Volume ShadowCopy Services (VSS) a storage feature of Windows Server 2003. The show SAN also has HP's own Contionuous Access Storage Application (CASA), which replicates across multiple storage appliances..." ========================================================== This article did not state if their design used different types of fabric switches or any of the embedded intelligent switches. Also, note that HP only promised the architectural framework of "intelligent virtualisation" and that to me sounds like it is still work in progress. Still,it is great news to hear that HP is very interested in Brocade's VSAN storage solution. EKS

To: Lizzie Tudor who wrote (1330)	1/21/2003 8:07:40 AM
From: Bob Frasca	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1583

I don't think it sounds like any kind of sales agreement at all. It's a partnership to develop something that doesn't actually exist in a market (software) that Brocade doesn't usually play in. There is no guarantee that there will EVER be any revenue from it. It sounds like Brocade is trying to do a little value-added software upgrade to their existing management platform. Something they deliver as part of their hardware product anyway. I'm not saying this is a bad thing but it is something that they would need to do anyway simply to remain competitive. The whole thing is entirely dependent on closing the Rhapsody Networks deal. I find it interesting they would even release this when THAT deal hasn't closed yet. Seems a bit premature. I'm thinking that Brocade is trying to mitigate some potentially bad news by trying to put out some potentially good news. Perhaps the acquisition is not going as planned... Brocade will be delivering the SilkWorm Fabric Application Platform as a result of its intended acquisition of Rhapsody Networks. Brocade participation in this agreement is subject to the closure of Brocade's acquisition of Rhapsody, which is expected to occur shortly.