IBM Introduces Virtual Fabric Architecture for BladeCenter; Breakthrough Connectivity Speeds Help Enable Advanced Technologies Such as Web 2.0, IPTV, Online Gaming

Market Wire, January, 2007

Today IBM (NYSE: IBM) introduced 'Virtual Fabric Architecture,' new interconnect technologies and management tools for the BladeCenter H system, to help increase speed and efficiency of data transfer across blade servers and networks. IBM Virtual Fabric Architecture has enabled IBM BladeCenter to deliver up to 43 percent system bandwidth advantage over HP BladeSystem for customers.

The explosion of new consumer technologies such as Web 2.0, IPTV, and online gaming, and business technologies such as quad-core processing and virtualization, are driving the need for high bandwidth interconnect technologies to move data traffic across high capacity networks. Introduced less than a year ago, IBM BladeCenter H is a high performance system that delivers the increased bandwidth needed by providing businesses up to 10 times the capacity to move data across their networks.

To help unleash the power inherent in the BladeCenter H design to further support such cutting edge technologies and applications, IBM is working with partners to introduce its Virtual Fabric Architecture with technologies including:

--  Nortel 10G Ethernet Switch from BLADE Network Technologies and NetXen
    10G Ethernet Expansion Card: An industry first complete solution with 10G
    Ethernet connectivity directly to a blade server from IBM's collaboration
    with BLADE Network Technologies and NetXen. The Nortel 10G Ethernet switch
    provides the highest levels of connectivity and ensures optimal throughput
    between each BladeCenter server in a system and to the network core. The
    NetXen 10G expansion card provides high-performance, cost effective
    connectivity for the blade. The solution offers breakthrough 10G Ethernet
    pricing, an order of magnitude less than other offerings in the industry.

--  Cisco Embedded Fibre Channel Fabric Switch: An industry first, the new
    Cisco embedded switch will allow customers to deploy end-to-end Cisco
    intelligent SAN services, such as VSANs, advanced security, and high
    availability. The new Fibre Channel switch is the next phase in a series of
    collaborations in switching between IBM and Cisco, and expands the
    switching solution offerings to include Fibre Channel, Ethernet and
    InfiniBand options.

--  QLogic Ethernet and Fibre Channel InfiniBand Bridge Modules: An
    industry first in conjunction with the Cisco 4X InfiniBand Switch Module
    provides gateway functions for one or more InfiniBand-connected group of
    BladeCenter H systems to external Gb Ethernet or Fibre Channel networks.

--  IBM BladeCenter Address Manager: Allows for the I/O virtualization of
    Ethernet and Fibre Channel connections within a system by providing
    BladeCenter customers the option to assign Ethernet and Fibre Channel port
    addresses used by their server blades via software as an alternative to the
    addresses that are burned-in to the hardware during manufacturing.
    BladeCenter Address Manager also uniquely supports a variety of fabrics
    from IBM ecosystem partners.

--  IBM Multi-Switch Interconnect Module (MSIM): Designed by IBM to help
    double the number of Fibre Channel or Gb Ethernet connections to each
    blade. MSIM fits into the high speed switch slots in BladeCenter H,
    supports the entire BladeCenter switch portfolio.
    

IBM offers the widest range of networking and storage switches than any other blade vendor, and has shipped more than two million one-Gigabit Ethernet ports to date. Today we extend that lead by delivering even more I/O solutions including the industry's first integrated 10-Gigabit Ethernet connectivity to a blade.

"IBM BladeCenter is the world's most popular blade computing system, with more than 42 percent share of the market according to IDC. Since its introduction in 2002, IBM has installed more than half a million BladeCenter systems for customers and maintained a durable infrastructure platform by delivering new technology advances that remain compatible with IBM's original design innovation," said Doug Balog, vice president and business line executive, IBM BladeCenter. "With today's announcement it is clear that IBM has uniquely architected all facets of I/O to work as a central nervous system for IBM BladeCenter, delivering the optimal interconnection between blades, chassis, switches and our client's external networks."

Greater Portfolio Integration for IT Management

IBM is collaborating with Cisco to provide BladeCenter customers access to Cisco VFrame, a datacenter provisioning and orchestration product that enables utility computing, or the ability to rapidly commission and decommission shared pools of server and I/O resources on demand. VFrame system management software creates virtual "compute services" by programming server switches to map diskless servers to a shared pool of I/O and storage resources. VFrame dramatically reduces total cost of ownership by enabling administrators to provision compute services in seconds, not days or weeks; automate tasks based on business policies; and simplify network and server architectures.