Hilton Grand Vacations Wins Technology Managers Forum 2008 Best Practices Award for Storage Management

3PAR ® (NYSE: PAR), the leading global provider of utility storage , announced today that 3PAR customer Hilton Grand Vacations was awarded first place by the Technology Managers Forum in the category of Storage Management as part of their 2008 Best Practice Awards program. Hilton Grand Vacations' storage infrastructure -- built on highly virtualized and energy-efficient 3PAR Utility Storage -- was chosen for having achieved a standard of excellence that provides a model for the industry that can be quantified, adapted, and repeated.

"We are very excited to not only be recognized for the success of our global datacenter virtualization project, but to be held up as a model for the rest of the industry," said Rich Jackson, Vice President of Technology Operations at Hilton Grand Vacations. "With 3PAR as the foundation of our storage infrastructure, we have quadrupled administrative efficiency and can now provision virtualized servers and storage in minutes versus weeks."

Hilton Grand Vacations, the timeshare division of Hilton Hotels Corporation, had previously implemented 3PAR Utility Storage to support key mission-critical applications. Last year, Hilton Grand Vacations decided to embark on a worldwide virtualization strategy to address the company's growth and the resulting "server sprawl" that was weighing down operations. In addition to selecting multiple 3PAR InServ® Storage Servers to be dispersed geographically, the company also implemented a complete virtual datacenter based on the 3cV blueprint . "3cV" stands for the combination of the 3PAR InServ Storage Server, HP BladeSystem c-Class, and VMware® Infrastructure.

For Hilton Grand Vacations, building a flexible and highly virtualized utility computing environment with 3PAR and 3cV was simple and easy, a logical and natural progression as they evolved their datacenter in response to their virtualization initiatives. All the elements of 3cV are qualified to work together, so integrating them into Hilton's environment was a smooth process that Hilton says yielded a utility computing environment with transformative levels of agility and efficiency.

With their new virtualized infrastructure built on 3PAR and 3cV, Hilton Grand Vacations has experienced significant benefits that include the following:

--  Achieved significant cost savings
--  Reduced storage management time by 75%
--  Increased storage administrative efficiency by 4x
--  Increased Microsoft® SQL Server® performance by 3x
--  Decreased server and storage provisioning time by 90%
--  Implemented cost-effective disaster recovery without reliance on
    professional services
--  Automated formerly manual processes such as storage allocation and
    service level optimization

With 3PAR and 3cV, Hilton Grand Vacations has also realized an unexpectedly positive result of combined server and storage virtualization: substantial reduction in their datacenter footprint. The company's datacenter is now 50 to 70% smaller. This not only enables Hilton to save up to 75% on power, cooling, and housing datacenter equipment, but it also reduces their environmental impact and rewards the decision to replace legacy equipment with more efficient, sustainable technologies.

"The reduced footprint is really something that we feel has been advantageous in terms of not just saving money, but also in helping our environment and reducing our carbon footprint overall -- which is something that's becoming an important corporate focus," said Jackson. "This unexpected result has proven to be a significant benefit for both Hilton Grand Vacations and the environment."

"Having worked with Hilton Grand Vacations since before the launch of their global datacenter project, we are thrilled to see the benefits of their highly virtualized utility computing infrastructure held up as a model for the rest of the industry," said David Scott, 3PAR President and CEO.

About Hilton Grand Vacations

Hilton Grand Vacations Company, LLC, is a division of Hilton Hotels Corporation, recognized as the leading global hospitality company. Headquartered in Orlando, Florida, Hilton Grand Vacations develops, markets, and operates a system of brand-name, high-quality vacation ownership resorts in select vacation destinations. The company also manages and operates two innovative club membership programs: Hilton Grand Vacations Club® and The Hilton Club®, providing exclusive exchange, leisure travel, and reservation services for more than 137,000 Club members.

About Technology Managers Forum

Technology Managers Forum (TechForum) is a professional association for IT managers at mid- to large-sized corporations in the New York area. Technology Managers Forum's goal is to provide a venue for effective, informative communication between Fortune 1000 technology managers and technology providers. TechForum events bring together IT customers and IT vendors in an interactive atmosphere (conferences and smaller meetings) of unedited debate and non-commercial dialogue focusing on the most current and compelling enterprise IT issues.