Storage:

McDATA's 2Gb/s Storage Networking Products Now Shipping

McDATA Corporation, a worldwide leader in open storage networking solutions, announced that its 2Gb/s Intrepid 6000 Series Director, 16- and 32-port Sphereon 3000 Series Fabric Switches are shipping to customers worldwide. The availability of McDATA's 2Gb/s core-to-edge storage networking products continues its strong leadership in the high-end Director market. McDATA continues to set the standard in the Director market with 90.5 percent of all ports shipped, according to an upcoming industry analyst report, and McDATA also grabbed 6.9 percent of the switch market in 2001, during the first six months McDATA began shipping its Fabric Switches.

To date, McDATA has shipped more than 12,000 2Gb/s ports to OEMs, master resellers and numerous customer sites. Those customers include large governmental entities, major insurance companies, international financial institutions, major equipment manufacturers and a Fortune 500 telecommunications firm.

The availability of McDATA's full family of 2Gb/s products also marks the launch of McDATA's Flexport Technology for the Sphereon 3000 Series product line. McDATA's Flexport Technology allows customers to add ports on an "as needed" basis and without disruption. For example, McDATA's Sphereon 3216 Fabric Switch can be configured as an 8-port model with the ability to expand to 16 ports without service interruption. The Sphereon 3232 Fabric Switch can be configured in 16-, 24-, and 32-port increments, depending on the customer's needs. McDATA's Flexport Technology enables unrivalled flexibility for smallto large-enterprise customers looking to deploy cost-effective storage networking solutions. McDATA Flexport Technology has always been available on the Intrepid Director, which is upgradeable in increments of 4 ports, delivering to customers industry-leading capacity on demand.

McDATA is the only storage networking company in the world today shipping a true 2Gb/s Director and a full family of 2Gb/s storage networking products. McDATA's full family of core-to-edge, 2Gb/s storage networking products are built on its common Extendable Open Network (EON) Architecture that brings industry-leading investment protection, minimization of risk, availability and performance to the market. All of McDATA's hardware products are supported by its award-winning storage network management software, SANavigator.

About McDATA's Intrepid 6000 Series Directors

The McDATA Intrepid 6000 Series Director is the industry's only 2Gb/s, multi-protocol Director with the ability to support the rigorous demands of enterprise data centres. McDATA Intrepid Directors are deployed in the majority of the world's data centers because of their ultra high availability (99.999 percent uptime); ability to handle both mainframe (FICON) and open systems (Fibre Channel) data traffic; non-disruptive code load and activation capabilities (McDATA's HotCAT Technology); and their support for emerging technologies such as 10Gb/s, iSCSI, FCIP and InfiniBand. The McDATA Intrepid is built on McDATA's common Extendable Open Network (EON) Architecture that ensures unwavering data availability, ease of management and lower overall IT costs. More information on McDATA's Directors can be found at www.mcdata.com/solutions/sanhardware/intrepid/index.html.

About McDATA's Sphereon 3000 Series Fabric Switches

McDATA's Sphereon 3000 Series Fabric Switches are the highest availability products in their class and bring to the mid-range market many attributes of McDATA Directors such as HotCAT Technology (non-disruptive code load and activation) and the highest port density in the industry. The Sphereon 3000 Series product line -- including the only 32-port switch available today -- is the only mid-range switch family in the industry built on Director-class technology, offering optimal scalability, performance, management and availability. More information on McDATA's Sphereon 3000 Series Fabric Switches can be found at
www.mcdata.com/solutions/sanhardware/sphereon/index.html.

About SANavigator

SANavigator, the most advanced SAN management software product in the storage network management market, greatly simplifies storage network management and ensures that a customer's SAN is performing optimally, improving reliability, minimising risk, maximising resources and ensuring a greater return on investment (ROI). This efficient, open-system platform provides a comprehensive, intuitive set of management tools, allowing IT administrators to optimise the capabilities of their storage networks while simplifying many of the day-to-day management tasks.

SANavigator has won a series of industry awards this year such as Network Computing's Well Connected Award and the prestigious Network Computing Editor's Choice award for the industry's best SAN management software. SANavigator also earned the highest score for Management and Administration in Network World's recent SAN product review. TechTarget's 2002 Innovator Award was awarded to BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee on the basis of the performance acquired and the resulting ROI achieved by their SANavigator management tool. More information on SANavigator can be found at 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.