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400,000 ALPHA/TRUE64 SERVERS -- SUN WANTS YOU!

Sun Microsystems, Inc. announced a new program designed to take advantage of disruption within a competitor's installed base and move these customers to a Sun Solaris environment. The HP Away migration program offers a no-risk alternative for customers fed-up with the havoc created by the end of development for the Alpha/Tru64 platform, and forced migration to Itanium- based systems -- a platform with a questionable track record and limited industry support. Sun is taking advantage of this opportunity to aggressively attract new customers in the very lucrative UNIX server market.

Industry analyst Michael Dortch of Robert Frances Group (RFG) sees a real opportunity, for enterprise IT users and for Sun. "HP's vision of the future for its AlphaServer customers is heavily reliant on the Itanium architecture, which has so far found widespread enterprise adoption an elusive goal. IT executives should realize that if Itanium server shipments don't reach levels that are economically sustainable for HP, the company could be forced to consider migrating Alpha/Tru64 customers to still another platform. AlphaServer users have to move anyway, so Sun is offering them a chance to move to solutions from a vendor with proven, sustained success in the enterprise. It's a smart strategy, for Sun and for many current AlphaServer users."

"Its not everyday a competitor unlocks its vault and makes it easy to steal away their customers," said Larry Singer, Sun's vice president, global information systems strategy office. "We have a golden opportunity to grow our UNIX server leadership position. We're fully mobilized to target the entire Alpha/Tru64 installed base, with the goal of moving a large percentage to Sun Solaris. We're confident that customers comparing the proven track record of SPARC and Solaris to the shaky history of Itanium will choose Sun."

HP Away Program Details

As a result of HP's plans, an estimated 400,000 Alpha/Tru64 installed servers have to be moved to a new architecture and operating environment, the only question is to which platform and vendor. Sun is offering a shared, no risk model where the company works with customers to deploy an effective migration solution. Included in the program is a free two-day assessment, designed to determine the cost and technical requirements involved in a migration. Customers that meet the determined requirements will also receive the following:

• A two-week Alpha/Tru64 to Solaris OS migration assessment service, at no risk.
• if the customer decides not to proceed with the Tru64 to Solaris migration, Sun absorbs the cost of the two-week migration assessment service.
• Sun will defer payment for the entire migration-including Sun services, servers, and software-until completion of the engagement (not to exceed 90 days).
• if they decide to proceed, application porting is offered through Sun's professional services group, teamed with ISVs, systems administrators and Sun's iForce centers.
• Financing and trade-in offers to ease the financial transition to Sun.

For more information on the HP Away migration program go to http://www.sun.com/tru64migration.

About Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Since its inception in 1982, a singular vision -- "The Network is the Computer" -- has propelled Sun Microsystems, Inc. to its position as a leading provider of industrial-strength hardware, software and services that make the Net work. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the World Wide Web at http://sun.com/.