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McDATA SHOWCASES NEXT-GENERATION TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS

McDATA Corporation, a worldwide leader in open storage networking solutions, displayed pre-production, next generation technology solutions during its annual financial analyst day event at its Broomfield headquarters on Friday, March 8.

Attendees saw an unprecedented display of enhanced features and pre-production products further extending McDATA's core-to-edge enterprise solutions. The SAN Showcase spotlighted enhancements in McDATA's EON (Extendable Open Network) Architecture, and its Epoch Software Architecture, as well as the products resulting from these enhancements, including its core-to-edge family of 2Gb/s Directors and Fabric Switches. Discussions and demonstrations at this event further illustrated McDATA's commitment to open storage networking solutions and its long-range vision for the migration from Storage Area Networks to multi-protocol Systems Area Networks, incorporating McDATA's extensive knowledge in fibre channel, adding FCIP, iSCSI, and other emerging technologies. At the event, McDATA spotlighted the following critical components that support its technology vision:

McDATA's Fabric Virtualisation Services -- McDATA's Fabric Virtualisation Services brings to the customer a self-managing, self-provisioning and intelligent storage network. Fabric Virtualisation is a vision that leverages McDATA's leading software technology

• Visualisation, Virtualisation and Automation -- to take advantage of tightly integrated solutions between heterogeneous hardware, software and expertise to provide increasing customer value.
• Virtualises physical interconnect devices and different protocols into one manageable virtual network -- Abstracts the network regardless of how it is routed so that the host sees an optimized connection that is delivered as a service to servers and storage -- Improves storage network utilization and storage network management productivity -- Complements storage management and storage virtualisation through optimising the network performance

McDATA Security -- McDATA will drive value-added security that delivers a secure network solution by leveraging its proven data centre security experience and leadership. By extending security features and functions as storage networks evolve past the traditional, trusted environment, McDATA is developing an inclusive strategy based upon policies and perimeter security technologies that will deliver robust authorization and intrusion detection.

• Continuing its active leadership role in the ANSI security committee, McDATA will continue its open policy by sharing its technology and experience in developing security standards.

McDATA's EON Architecture -- All of McDATA's core-to-edge family of fabric switch and Director products are based on its Extendable Open Network (EON) Architecture. The serial crossbar architecture was designed to provide customers with ultra high (99.999 percent) availability, unrivalled performance, and easy scalability as their storage requirements evolve. The power of this architecture allows McDATA's extensive installed base to take advantage of these technology enhancements for unparalleled investment protection. The ability of McDATA's EON Architecture to support 2Gb/s and 10Gb/s transfer rates, as well as emerging technologies such as FCIP, iSCSI and Infiniband, further extends its customers' investment protection. Elements of the EON Architecture in the SAN showcase include:

• Intrepid 6000 Series Directors -- McDATA's next generation 140-port ultra high availability Director -- Intrepid 6064 Director, the only Director that is upgradeable to 2Gb/s and 10Gb/s - shipping since May 2001.
• Intrepid 6000 Series Directors support FICON, iSCSI and FCIP protocols
• Sphereon 3000 Series Fabric Switches -- 32-port 2Gb/s Fabric Switches, extending McDATA's leadership as the only 32-port switch in the industry -- 16-port 2Gb/s Fabric Switch
• Interoperability: Demonstration of McDATA's Fabric Switch and Director products interoperating with other fibre channel vendors in a heterogeneous fabric environment
• Patented Template Register technology: Non-intrusively reads frame header contents, allowing comprehensive monitoring of traffic patterns, performance monitoring, and usage trends. This patented technology provides predictability of services within the fabric.
• Multi-protocol platform demonstrations

Epoch Software Architecture -- McDATA's comprehensive and industry-leading storage networking software architecture is the foundation for McDATA's entire software suite. EpochSA is a platform-based solution that enhances the intelligence, design and functionality of the fabric and the storage infrastructure.

• Enterprise Operating System (E/OS): The high availability, non-disruptive firmware inherent in McDATA's Fabric Switches and Directors.
• Managed Fabric Services: A collection of extended device functionality that exploits the hardware's capabilities, utilizing features of the EON Architecture such as Template Register technology.
• FICON Management Server: Inband management for FICON environments
• Enterprise Fabric: Allows FICON Directors to be incorporated into a meshed fabric with connectivity between FICON Directors. This provides customers with advanced FICON capability.
• Open System Management Server: OSMS enables a broad, comprehensive fabric management offering by independent software vendors through the FC-GS-3 industry standard.
• Open Trunking: Provides an ultra flexible hardware-independent solution for load balancing of traffic over inter-switch links (ISLs), maximizing inter-switch performance for optimised storage networks. Open Trunking also reduces the number of ISLs and enables a whole new level of functionality our competition cannot match.
• Performance Management: Monitors traffic patterns at the port and fabric level and reports key performance management information to the proper report management tool.
• Clustering: Enables groups of Directors and Fabric Switches to be managed as a single entity, simplifying management and reducing complexity.
• SANavigator: The industry's most comprehensive platform for managing multi-vendor fabrics will be featured. SANavigator is McDATA's award-winning fabric management software that provides customers unparalleled planning, discovery, management and automation capabilities.
• McDATA's Comprehensive API strategy, called Connectors (announced on February 25, 2002) will also be discussed. McDATA Connectors allow customers for the first time to manage their end-to-end, multi-vendor open systems from a single point of control. Customers will be able to implement best-of-breed applications and elements specifically suited to their storage networking needs with the assurance that the McDATA and partner technologies are fully supported.

Presentations were given by members of McDATA's executive management team, including Jack McDonnell, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman; John Kelley, Chief Operating Officer and president; Janet Cooper, Chief Financial Officer; Jim Kuenzel, vice president of Engineering; and Mike Gustafson, vice president of Worldwide Sales. General availability of the products and features listed above will be announced at later times.

For more information about McDATA or SANavigator visit www.mcdata.com or www.sanavigator.com.

About McDATA

McDATA is a worldwide leader in open storage networking solutions and provides highly available, scalable and centrally managed storage area networks (SANs) that address enterprise-wide storage problems. McDATA's core-to-edge enterprise SAN solutions improve the reliability and availability of data to simplify SAN management and reduce the total cost of ownership. McDATA extensively pre-tests its solutions to provide IT organizations with the comprehensive tools, methodologies and support essential to robust SAN implementation. McDATA distributes its products through its OEMs, network of resellers and Elite Solution Partners.