Features - Storage Innovations:

StoreAge SOLUTIONS PORT TO SilkWorm FABRIC APP PLATFORM

StoreAge Networking Technologies, an innovator in enterprise SAN storage management, recently announced that it has completed porting the industry's first data snapshot, replication and migration solutions for use with Brocade Communications Systems' (Brocade) SilkWorm Fabric Application Platform (SilkWorm Fabric AP), the industry's first open, intelligent platform for fabric applications. With StoreAge's multiView and multiCopy applications running on the SilkWorm Fabric AP, customers can centrally manage the creation of instant read/write copies of any data on any storage device in a SAN, as well as non-disruptively migrate data between heterogeneous storage devices while production applications remain online.

The SilkWorm Fabric AP comprises a new family of intelligent fabric application switches designed to host fabric-based applications such as StoreAge multiView and multiCopy. By using multiView and multiCopy on the Fabric AP, customers can enhance the continuity of their businesses by:

• Eliminating backup windows by using instant, read/write, low-capacity snapshots to backup data to either disk or tape without disrupting production applications
• Rapidly restoring data from disk to previous points-in-time, minimizing both system downtime and data loss
• Accelerating application testing and reducing post-deployment errors and support costs by testing with instantly available copies of production data
• Migrating live data from any device, to any device, at any location while production applications remain online and fully available

In addition, since all of the above functions take place within the SilkWorm Fabric AP, these processes are offloaded from both servers and storage devices, eliminating a common cause of performance degradation.

"With a new class of intelligent storage switches hitting the market, software providers now have a chance to change the way they add value for customers," said Bill North, Director, Storage Management Research at IDC. "Business continuity software, running in the fabric of the storage network, is one excellent example of how applications running on these new platforms could change the face of the storage industry."

"Deploying StoreAge's SAN-wide data replication and data movement capabilities on the SilkWorm Fabric AP provide enhanced manageability for customers with fast-growing and increasingly heterogeneous storage environments," said Mark Spowart, president of StoreAge. "These solutions deliver a uniform, centralized, fabric-based method for copying and migrating data regardless of the operating systems or storage devices in use."

"We are delivering the industry's first open, intelligent platform for fabric-based applications, and our teamwork with StoreAge will help significantly extend the functionality, simplify the management, and reduce the operational cost and complexity of managing and administering enterprise storage environments," said Dave Stevens, Brocade Director of Business Development.

"By adding a new SilkWorm Fabric AP switch to an existing Brocade SAN, customers can add these cutting-edge storage and data management capabilities with the assurance of compatibility with thousands of existing SANs across the world utilizing Brocade technology."