CUNY to Form Open Source Solutions Lab with Collaboration from Red Hat and Intel

Business Wire, Sept 3, 2008

Red Hat, Intel and CUNY to Provide Testing Lab for Open Source Technologies

RALEIGH, N.C. -- Red Hat (NYSE:RHT), the world's leading provider of open source solutions, today announced a collaboration with Intel and the City University of New York (CUNY) to form the New York City Open Source Solutions Lab at the CUNY Institute for Software Design and Development. The facility will be a state-of-the-art center in which New York-based government IT professionals can test open source software solutions based on Intel architecture.

The Open Source Solutions Lab, based at the CUNY Graduate Center, houses hardware provided by Intel[R] Corporation and Red Hat Enterprise Linux software donated by Red Hat. In addition to hardware and software, the companies are also supplying support services. CUNY's Institute for Software Design and Development, which serves as a research partner for New York City government agencies, is providing its extensive industry expertise to the project.

University Executive Vice Chancellor and Chief Operating Officer Allan Dobrin stated, "We are proud of CUNY's long history of engagement with New York's private industry and government. Given the growth potential of the open source market, we anticipate that CUNY's Institute for Software Design and Development will offer significant assistance to government agencies in evaluating and testing new open source technology solutions that will enable them to better serve our City's residents."

"Government entities across the country have seen tremendous value from open source solutions like Red Hat Enterprise Linux," said Paul Smith, vice president of Government Sales Operations at Red Hat. "The Solutions Lab provides the ideal environment for New York-based agencies and departments to see the benefits for themselves. Adoption of open source is growing rapidly across the public sector and with this Solutions Lab, New York has put itself in the forefront of open source innovation."

"This innovative collaboration, enabling the creation of the Open Source Solutions Lab, is an idea whose time has come," said Paul J. Cosgrave, Chief Information Officer for the City of New York and Commissioner of the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications. "This Lab will facilitate open source adoption throughout the City where appropriate. It's an ideal proving ground for testing the value proponent of open source and leveraging those cost savings for our agencies."

The Open Source Solutions Lab is designed to help New York City area public sector government IT professionals consider more cost-effective and flexible technology options prior to deployment. The establishment of a stable and defined IT environment, combined with the availability of extensive support services, makes the OSSL an ideal place for examining and testing Open Source solutions.

An Advisory Board will oversee the Solutions Lab. City and State IT professionals will be able to make an appointment to use the Lab for testing activities and support services.

"Open source applications offer great promise, especially in cost of ownership," said Ram Peddibhotla, Director of Intel Open Source Technology Center. "Intel and Red Hat support this Open Source Solutions Lab so that New York government IT professionals have an ideal environment to test these applications on our next-generation Intel[R] multi-core technology and prepare for successful deployments."

For more information about Red Hat, visit www.redhat.com. For more news, more often, visit www.press.redhat/.com.> About Red Hat, Inc.

Red Hat, the world's leading open source solutions provider, is headquartered in Raleigh, NC with over 60 satellite offices spanning the globe. CIOs have ranked Red Hat first for value in Enterprise Software for four consecutive years in the CIO Insight Magazine Vendor Value survey. Red Hat provides high-quality, affordable technology with its operating system platform, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, together with applications, management and Services Oriented Architecture (SOA) solutions, including JBoss Enterprise Middleware. Red Hat also offers support, training and consulting services to its customers worldwide. Learn more: http://www.redhat.com.

About The City University of New York

The City University of New York is the nation's largest urban public university. Founded in New York City in 1847 as The Free Academy, the University comprises 23 institutions: 11 senior colleges, six community colleges, the William E. Macaulay Honors College at CUNY, the Graduate School and University Center, the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, the CUNY School of Law, the CUNY School of Professional Studies and the Sophie Davis School of Biomedical Education. The University serves more than 231,000 degree-credit students and more than 231,000 adult, continuing and professional education students. College Now, the University's academic enrichment program for 32,500 high school students, is offered at CUNY campuses and more than 300 high schools throughout the five boroughs of the City of New York. The University offers online baccalaureate degrees through the School of Professional Studies and individualized baccalaureate through the CUNY Baccalaureate Degree. The University Teacher Academy provides free tuition for highly motivated mathematics and science majors who seek teaching careers in the city.