Storage: EMC and CNT Team to Deliver Complete Wide-Area Enterprise Storage Network Solutions - EMC and Computer Network Technology in software/service marketing agreement - Company Business and Marketing

Edge: Work-Group Computing Report, May 17, 1999

EMC Corporation, the world's leading provider of enterprise storage systems, software and services, and Computer Network Technology (CNT), a leader in wide area network (WAN) technology, Monday announced a marketing, service and support alliance. The two companies will provide complementary professional services and linked customer support organizations to complement their existing product solutions, which enable companies to instantly mirror their information over long distances.

The combination of EMC's Symmetrix Remote Data Facility (SRDF) software and the proven mission-critical, wide-area networking capabilities of CNT's UltraNet and Channelink products, means customers are able to cost-effectively and instantly transfer their EMC Enterprise Storage system-based information over extended distances to achieve the highest levels of management, protection and sharing. As a component of an EMC Enterprise Storage Network (ESN), information from dozens of Windows NT servers, UNIX servers and mainframes can be mirrored simultaneously, an ideal solution for high availability requirements and disaster recovery applications.

The alliance enhances the companies' existing relationship and takes the next step in delivering value-added services to customers. CNT is offering an exclusive package of its hardware, software and implementation services for EMC customers. A cooperative support agreement between the two companies ensures that any customer issues are rapidly addressed, while both the EMC and CNT sales and professional service teams will work together on joint opportunities.

"Our clients demand maximum uptime for the enterprise applications they outsource from us, so our network can not tolerate outages or delayed service delivery," said John Liccione, Vice President of Advanced Product Engineering at USinternetworking, Inc., an application service provider delivering business applications over the Internet. "We elected to use the remote data mirroring solution provided by EMC and CNT to ensure continuous replication between our Enterprise Data Centers. The nature of our business requires uninterrupted performance and integrity of the network and computing platform, which now has added protection from EMC and CNT professional services and their linked customer support organizations."

Frank Farese, EMC's Vice President of Global Alliances, said, "As corporations build and deploy global information infrastructures, the ability to move and share information over long distances is a key requirement. EMC's SRDF technology, combined with CNT networking technology and expertise, gives customers additional tools in order to quickly implement EMC Enterprise Storage Networks that provide unmatched levels of information protection, availability and flexibility."

"As the telecommunications landscape continues to shift and change throughout Europe, we are constantly challenged to converge diverse technologies from distant areas," said Patrice Coquet, Global Engineering Manager at Cegetel, the first private telecommunications operator in France. "Remote data mirroring with EMC and CNT assures higher data availability of our unified network by providing a disaster recovery solution over extended distances and diverse platforms. We're pleased about the collaboration between two of our important technology providers because it ensures continued product cohesion between SRDF and UltraNet and secures our guarantee for the highest levels of support."

Thomas G. Hudson, president and chief executive officer of CNT said, "One of the most challenging aspects of deploying a global information infrastructure is the complexity and cost associated with networking over a wide area. By working in conjunction with EMC, and taking advantage of the unique capabilities of both our technologies, we are able to provide customers with a complete and highly-efficient solution for remote data mirroring, one that continues to support and enhance a customer's application long after installation."

EMC Corporation, a Fortune 500 company based in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, is the world's technology and market leader in the rapidly growing market for intelligent enterprise storage systems, software and services. The company's products store, retrieve, manage, protect and share information from all major computing environments, including UNIX, Windows NT and mainframe platforms. The company has offices worldwide, trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol EMC, and is a component of the S&P 500 Index. For further information about EMC and its storage solutions, EMC's corporate web site can be accessed at http://www.EMC.com.

Computer Network Technology (Nasdaq:CMNT), based in Minneapolis, Minn., is a global company providing high-performance Storage Area Networking solutions, Enterprise Application Integration tools, and world-class support services. The company's Channelink, FileSpeed, and UltraNet product lines offer high-speed open systems connectivity, access to legacy data, and guaranteed data integrity for applications such as backup/restore, disk mirroring and disaster recovery. CNT hardware, software, and services are used by organizations around the world to integrate large, business-critical applications and storage environments. The company's products are sold worldwide through a direct sales force and a network of authorized distributors. FMI: http://www.cnt.com, or call 1-800-638-8324 (U.S.) or 612-797-6000 (International).