Bull announced the Bull NovaScale 5160 server has reached a performance of 12 865.4 QphH@1000 GB (Query per Hour) under the TPC-H Business Intelligence benchmark, running the latest preliminary version of the Microsoft SQL Server 2005 database. The result, achieved in Bull’s labs in France, demonstrates significant performance improvements compared to the Microsoft SQL Server 2000 version. It was established on a Bull NovaScale 5160 server. NovaScale server is used by Microsoft in Redmond for the optimization of SQL Server 2005. The TPC-H benchmark is a renowned international benchmark that measures the performance of a complete platform, including server, database and storage components within the frame of Business Intelligence applications. More and more companies, whichever business sector they are involved in, whichever department is concerned, require Business Intelligence tools. In this context, the performance of the new version of SQL Server 2005 on Bull NovaScale servers appears as a key asset giving a measurable competitive edge to their users. “Business Intelligence tools manage increasingly complex environments with increasing number of data, concurrent users and ad’hoc requests,” stated Henri Pfahl, Vice President of the NovaScale server business unit of Bull. “Evaluating and choosing the optimum data warehouse platform is key to take the right business decisions. With their respective offerings, Bull and Microsoft deliver the right combination.” SQL Server 2005 enhancements fit NovaScale benefits for deploying enterprise-class databases:  Performance and scalability with SQL Server 2005 table partitioning, snapshot isolation combined with 64-bit technology and the powerful architecture of Bull NovaScale large SMP servers.  Superior levels of robustness due to the combination of NovaScale reliability and availability features with SQL Server 2005 database mirroring, on-line restore and fast restart time.  High levels of security with SQL Server 2005 new security model and data encryption combined with mainframe-class NovaScale server features  Improved flexibility with Bull NovaScale partitioning and clustering features along with SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services cluster enablement.  Enhanced manageability with Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio and SQL Profiler combined with the NovaScale Master Management solution. “These benchmark results prove that SQL Server 2005 running on a Bull NovaScale 5160 server can address very large-scale processing requirements. SQL Server 2005 together with NovaScale Intel® Itanium®2 based servers make an ideal platform for high-performing business intelligence applications,” said Don Petersen, senior product manager for SQL Server at Microsoft Corp. Benchmark detailed results and configuration Model: Server Bull NovaScale 5160 OS: Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition Number and type of processors: 16 Intel® Itanium® 2 - 1.6GHz, 9MB cache Memory size: 64GB Data base size: 1TB QphH@1000 GB: 12 865.4 $/QphH@1000 GB: $ 43.91 More information  Transaction Processing Council site: http://www.tpc.org/tpch/  Bull NovaScale servers offer: www.bull.com/novascale  “Choosing Windows for the heart of the Data Center”: http://www.bull.com/novascale/dc/windows.php