INDUSTRY

The Itanium Solutions Alliance announced today that SAP AG, the world's leading provider of business software solutions, has joined its membership ranks and agreed to work with the Alliance on collaborative delivery of solutions within the public sector market segment, as well as delivery of Intel Itanium-based Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solutions. SAP has a proven track record of Itanium-based solution deployment. Working together to further proven ERP capabilities on Itanium platforms will enable more customers to take advantage of this powerful combination. "There's no question of SAP's leadership in enterprise computing solutions," said Kirk Skaugen, vice president and general manager, Server Products Group, Intel. "SAP's participation in the Itanium Solutions Alliance and collaborative work focused on ERP solutions and the Public Sector market segment will extend the value of the Alliance in bringing more compelling solutions to market. We welcome SAP to the Alliance and look forward to working closely with them on these important programs." "SAP has been collaborating with Intel to optimize mySAP Business Suite solutions and SAP NetWeaver stack on the Itanium Processor Family running 64-bit Windows, Linux and HP-UX operating systems," said Karl-Heinz Hess, senior vice president, Active Global Support, SAP AG. "We are excited to see the level of performance with the Intel Itanium 2 processor and hope that our participation in the Itanium Solutions Alliance will help to extend the development and reach of Itanium solutions throughout the world." A global organization, the Itanium Solutions Alliance was founded in September 2005 with a mission to accelerate Itanium solution deployments. The Alliance offers a suite of developer enabling programs including Developer Days, a Solutions Center Network and a Solutions Catalog. Membership to the Alliance is open to any enterprise and technical software supplier looking to optimize applications for Itanium environments or enterprise and technical computing providers looking to network with other leaders in delivery of best-in-breed computing solutions. More information about the Alliance and membership can be found at www.itaniumsolutionsalliance.org.