SANTA CLARA, CA -- Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Nasdaq: SUNW) announced today that Sun StorEdge(TM) 9900 series customers will be able to view and manage the entire storage network infrastructure by employing Sun StorEdge SRM, reportedly the industry's leading storage resource management software, and Hitachi Data Systems' recently released HiCommand(TM) software framework. This flexibility improves resource utilization, enhances business continuity solutions, and reduces administration overhead, all leading to the ability to meet and exceed Service Level Agreements (SLAs). By simplifying storage management functions, the amount of storage managed per administrator is increased dramatically. The benefits offered by this solution result in a significant reduction in TCO for the storage infrastructure. This announcement is another proof point of the advantages that Sun's customers achieve by selecting the Sun StorEdge 9900 series products, and further solidifies the company's position as the only systems vendor to deliver comprehensive storage management solutions to high-end enterprise customers. ``Sun continues to gain momentum in the storage arena through its recently announced alliance with Hitachi Data Systems, a collaboration between two industry leaders that is bearing fruit, as proven by this latest offering,'' said Marty Boos, chief architect and vice president of Information Services at Digital River, a leading global e-commerce outsource provider. ``Sun's storage strategy demonstrates leadership and an ability to execute on its vision.'' The Sun StorEdge 9900, Sun StorEdge SRM and HiCommand solution incorporates two leading-edge storage management frameworks: Sun's StorEdge SRM software is recognized throughout the industry as the leading storage resource management framework for providing centralized management of enterprise-wide heterogeneous storage resources. HiCommand, Hitachi Data Systems' new software framework, provides a Web-based management system for the Sun StorEdge 9900 series. Also integrated into the HiCommand suite is a set of Application Program Interfaces (APIs) that can be used by Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) to simplify the integration of their storage management products into the storage stack. ``Unlike storage-only vendors, Sun is able to deliver a complete, end-to-end IT infrastructure to its customers,'' said Mark Canepa, executive vice president of Sun Network Storage. ``With the recent introduction of the Sun StorEdge 9900 series, Sun now delivers best-in-class high-end enterprise storage solutions to complement our industry leading high-end servers. By adding the combination of Sun StorEdge SRM and HiCommand device management, Sun's customers get the lowest possible cost of ownership through integrated tools to help them understand, manage and optimize their storage.'' ``We view Sun's adoption of HiCommand as an endorsement of both the customer value that our software framework offers, and of the expanding relationship between the two companies,'' said Marlene Woodworth, executive vice president, general manager, Global Marketing and Operations for Hitachi Data Systems. ``The synergy between the product sets reflects the synergy between Sun and Hitachi Data Systems.'' The Sun StorEdge 9900 series provides best-of-class storage systems for high-end enterprise environments and features a newer switched architecture that is superior to the old bus/hub architectures used in EMC's Symmetrix and IBM's Shark. The Sun StorEdge 9900 series brings data center heterogeneity, mainframe connectivity, storage consolidation and extreme availability to Sun's large high-end enterprise and glass house customers who prefer a storage-centric (big box) architecture. For more information visit www.sun.com