EMC and Cisco Systems have announced the signing of a letter of intent to expand their existing relationship and, together, will deliver next-generation storage area network (SAN) technology.
Under the terms, EMC plans to resell and support the Cisco MDS 9000 family of multilayer directors and fabric switches as part of its set of Connectrix SAN infrastructure products. EMC also intends to develop software applications hosted on the MDS 9000 platform to provide customers with interoperability, management, storage intelligence and connectivity options for their current and future storage networking needs.
Cisco`s MDS 9000 intelligent multi-protocol storage networking solution, which helps customers more efficiently manage and use their storage resources, will be supported by a wide range of storage management capabilities being developed as part of EMC`s AutoIS (Automated Information Storage) management strategy.
"The cooperation between Cisco and EMC will allow us to integrate industry-leading networking and storage technologies as part of a fully supported, comprehensive SAN solution," said Alex Robertson, Technology Solutions Group Manager, EMC SA. "Our mutual customers will benefit from this agreement by being able to build larger, more scalable, and heterogeneous SANs that provide simplified, centralised management along with greater storage intelligence."
The Cisco MDS 9000 family has undergone extensive interoperability testing to ensure full support and manageability with EMC`s Symmetrix and CLARiiON networked storage systems and will be qualified as E-Lab Tested by EMC in May 2003. It will also be supported by EMC`s Control Center family of open management software products and, additionally, EMC will work on the development of network hosted open storage applications.
These applications will tightly integrate EMC`s storage delivery services such as storage management, path optimisation and data classification with Cisco`s intelligent network services such as security and traffic management. Cisco intends to provide technical support to EMC to accelerate EMC ControlCenter integration and development of network hosted open storage applications on the Cisco MDS 9000 family.
EMC and Cisco will also work under the planned agreement to define industry standards for intelligent switch application programming interfaces (APIs) as part of their work with the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA).
"EMC`s goal with automated networked storage is to automate and simplify customer environments," says Robertson. "The scalability, intelligence and manageability of the Cisco MDS 9000 family fits very well into that strategy. We`ve used our experience as leading providers of SAN technology to put these multi-layer switches and directors through our E-Lab testing process to ensure SAN components are interoperable and integrated as a total solution. This expanded relationship with Cisco gives our customers a scalable SAN infrastructure with multi-protocol connectivity, a platform for future network intelligence capabilities and the assurance of service and support by the world leader in networked storage."
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