The acquisition extends Sun’s existing storage software product line and enables Sun to take a leadership role in the emerging storage resource management market.
The acquisition of HighGround and the planned acquisition of LSC are key components in Sun’s strategy to deliver easily managed, open storage networks, said Ed Zander, president and chief operating officer, Sun Microsystems. Even with the changing U.S. economy, Sun is aggressively investing in storage to strengthen our product suite and bolster our already faster-than-market growth and momentum. These investments will have a direct impact on enabling our customers to lower their total cost of ownership for data storage.
Sun acquired HighGround in a stock-for-stock transaction. With the close of the deal, HighGround becomes part of Sun’s Network Storage organization, led by Executive Vice President Mark Canepa. HighGround’s SRM products are available now from Sun, reflecting a commitment to uninterrupted product delivery to SRM’s existing customer base while immediately bringing the benefits of this acquisition to Sun’s customers. The new product suite broadens Sun’s software portfolio and helps give customers the tools they need to take control over their complex storage environments.
ASG has been a Sun reseller for more than a decade, and we recently added HighGround SRM products to our portfolio, said John Murphy, executive vice president of ASG. We view this acquisition as a positive move. By combining HighGround’s open systems expertise in storage resource management with Sun’s competency in integratable, end-to-end solutions, we should be able to deliver even more value add to our customers to help them conquer their IT challenges.
Sun is a major force in the multi-billion dollar storage market and a leader in the movement toward open storage networks. HighGround’s SRM products will expand Sun’s offerings to include new storage resource management capabilities and multi-platform tools for easy management of data and efficient control of resources. The integration of HighGround’s products and expertise is a key component of Sun’s mission to connect anyone to the Web anywhere, anytime and on any device.
We use both Unix(R) and NT systems in our IT infrastructure, and we look forward to the addition of HighGround’s SRM solutions to the storage offerings from Sun, said Bill Wheeler, network systems engineer for VW Credit, Inc. This is a positive step toward enabling businesses like ours to realize the true benefits of easily managed, open storage networks. With its open-platform offerings and open-platform engineers, HighGround’s products fit perfectly with Sun’s strategy for open software and open storage networks.
