Features - Storage Innovations:

ARIO ENTERS OEM SERIAL I/O MARKET

ARIO Data Networks announced its entrance into the OEM serial I/O marketplace with a new approach to the development of entry-level and mid-range enterprise storage subsystems. The venture-funded company, which was formed by a seasoned team of OEM storage experts, will ship Serial ATA (SATA) and Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) solutions that address the market need for cost effective, modular, available and scalable storage subsystems.

Designed for storage area network (SAN), network attached storage (NAS) and direct attach storage (DAS) environments, ARIO's hardware controllers enable storage OEMs to integrate dramatically lower cost SATA disk drive technology into their subsystems. ARIO Data's family of high performance SATA controllers, announced separately today, is now available with Fibre Channel, Ultra 320 SCSI and iSCSI host connectivity.

Industry analysts expect Serial ATA and SAS to achieve widespread adoption over the next three years, accounting for up to two thirds of all multiuser and subsystem disk drives shipped in 2007, and billions of dollars in sales.

"By 2007, more than one-fourth of storage subsystem capacity shipped will incorporate SATA disks," said Robert Gray, research vice president at IDC. "Over the same period, storage system shipments will grow from 800 petabytes (PB) in 2003 to over 4,000PB in 2007. As both major storage OEMs and users will continue to demand high performance, availability and density, ARIO Data is well positioned to meet these SATA connectivity needs."

Gartner Dataquest, according to a report published in September 2003, expects SATA and SAS technology, ARIO Data's primary market, to comprise almost two thirds of all disk drives used in multiuser and subsystems environments by 2007. As John Monroe, research vice president at Gartner Dataquest noted in that study, "Many users will discover that systems configured with SATA HDDs can provide significant cost advantages with minimal, if any, sacrifice in performance, quality or reliability."

With these substantial savings, the cost of enterprise subsystems will be dramatically lowered, while at the same time enabling new storage applications for customers and new market opportunities for storage vendors.

"Next generation serial I/O technologies, such as Serial ATA and Serial Attached SCSI, will enable the deployment of affordable and flexible storage systems," said Johnny Tseng, founder and CEO of ARIO Data Networks. "ARIO Data provides its OEM partners the architecture, technology, product offering and feature sets they require for entry and mid-range enterprise subsystems, while at the same time delivering a significant reduction in subsystem total cost of ownership."