Lead-with-Innovation Strategy Pays Off as Customers Around the World Choose Sun for Everything from Chip Multithreading and Utility Computing to Solaris 10 and Java
Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW) today announced that in 2004 it rolled out the most innovative systems portfolio in the company’s 20-plus year history. Through its quarterly Network Computing launch cycle, Sun has demonstrated its commitment to delivering customer value through breakthrough Network Computing solutions that address critical business needs like complexity, interoperability, scalability and simplicity. The company’s totally refreshed product and services lineup is already changing industry dynamics and being applauded by customers and partners around the world.
“The breadth of Sun’s lineup today is stronger than at any time in Sun’s history and our competition is sitting up and taking note,” said Jonathan Schwartz, Sun’s president and chief operating officer. “Sun’s unwavering dedication to R&D enables us to supply our customers with technology and innovative pricing models that give them a competitive edge. The future of Network Computing will be driven by those willing to buck the status quo, conquer existing cultural barriers and shift capital away from today’s fixed-cost models and closed systems.”
Schwartz adds: “As bandwidth commoditizes, companies are leveraging the vast economies of scale delivered by outside providers of standards-based ‘Net services such as computing power, applications, and internet infrastructure. Sun’s transparent pricing, coupled with vendor-neutral technology, is providing the roadmap for our customers to get ahead of this trend and be the leaders of tomorrow.”
Over the past year, Sun has introduced hundreds of innovative products and services in its quarterly launch cycle that have helped customers reduce the cost and complexity of doing business over the network:
- The Launch of the Solaris 10 Operating System. With over 600 new innovations including ZFS file storage, Dynamic Tracing (D-Trace), containers and the best UNIX(R) to Linux interoperability, Solaris 10 sets a new benchmark for operating system performance, vendor neutrality and security. Sun also added 140 business software applications for Solaris 10 to the already 12,000 plus available to Solaris users.
- Sun Fire Systems Refresh with UltraSPARC(R) IV and Opteron. Optimized for chip multithreading, Sun’s dual core UltraSPARC IV processor has revamped Sun’s entire UltraSPARC family of systems enabling enterprises to “scale up” to nearly twice the horsepower of previous Sun systems in the same footprint and featuring better price-performance than IBM and HP offerings. This year also saw the introduction of the AMD Opteron processor into Sun Fire systems. Running 32-bit and 64-bit applications, Sun’s Opteron processor-based server is 45 percent faster than comparable systems and runs Solaris, Red Hat Linux, SUSE Linux or Windows operating systems with Microsoft Hardware Compatibility List (HCL) certifications. Sun continued to innovate in blade computing with the new dual processor x86 Sun Fire B200x Blade Server (with Intel Xeon processors) and the N1 Grid Provisioning Server 3.1 Blades Edition. A new Netra 440 server is the industry’s lowest-priced, ruggedized, four-way UltraSPARC server.
- Innovative New Storage Systems. Designed to help mid-market and enterprise customers simplify and improve data management, protection and compliance, Sun’s extensive revamp of its storage systems includes everything from a revolutionary midrange storage system that sets a new standard in scalability and price/performance and a new high-end enterprise storage platform with breakthrough virtualization, replication and data movement capabilities to the Sun StorEdge 5210 NAS device.
- New Subscription Models Make Flexible Computing a Reality. Sun took a lead in Utility Computing with the introduction of subscription-based Sun Preventive Services, Sun Utility Computing for StorEdge Systems, Utility Computing for High-End Grid and a new subscription-based pricing model for Solaris giving customers access to services, storage, software and grids of computing power as easily as buying utility services such as phone, power or water.
- Java Stays Hot as Leading Development Platform in Industry. The Java 2 Platform, Standard Edition 5 (J2SE 5) is the most significant upgrade to the Java platform and programming language since its initial release nearly a decade ago. With its integration into the Solaris 10 operating system and having been made available to other operating systems, Sun Java Enterprise System is the most vendor-neutral development platform in the industry. The Solaris 10 universal support for development tools and Java development platforms capped a year that included the introduction of Sun Java Enterprise System Release 2, Sun Java System RFID Software, and Sun Java Desktop System Release 2 as well as new tools like Sun Java Studio Enterprise, Sun Studio Creator and Sun Studio 8 bringing improved performance and productivity to developers.
- Other announcements included:
- A new update to Sun Cluster software, Sun’s high availability platform for improved predictability and resilience of business critical applications.
- The introduction of the Sun N2000 Series Secure Application Switch, a powerful new technology based on Sun’s Nauticus Networks acquisition that delivers the highest performing platform for cross-enterprise application delivery in the industry.
- The announcement of 20 new Sun Reference Architectures and Solutions including the Solaris optimized data center program that enable customers to gain quicker access to information and improve business intelligence, advance data center efficiency and achieve 70 percent scale out utilization at a fraction of the cost.
For more information on Sun’s 2004 Network Computer events, please visit www.sun.com/news. Sun’s next Network Computing event is slated for early February, 2005.
About Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Since its inception in 1982, a singular vision — “The Network Is The Computer” — has propelled Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW) to its position as a leading provider of industrial-strength hardware, software and services that make the Net work. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the World Wide Web at http://sun.com
Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, Solaris, Sun Fire, N1, StorEdge, Java and The Network Is The Computer are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States and other countries. All SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International, Inc. in the US and other countries. Products bearing SPARC trademarks are based upon an architecture developed by Sun Microsystems, Inc. UNIX is a registered trademark in the United States and other countries, exclusively licensed through X/Open Company Ltd.