INTERCONNECTS

Sun's Move to Top Spot Highlights Surging Momentum in HPTC Market -- Displaying its mounting strength in the high performance and technical computing market (HPTC), Sun Microsystems, Inc. today announced it has the number one position in total server units shipped, according to IDC's Q3CY03 Worldwide Technical Server report. For the quarter, Sun nearly doubled unit shipments (99.7 percent growth) versus 37.8 percent for the overall market quarter-over-quarter, achieving 46.9 percent unit market share. Adding to the impressive numbers, Sun's HPTC units grew 111 percent compared to 66 percent for the market as a whole when compared to the same period in 2002, making Sun the only vendor to outgrow the market in units shipped both year-over-year and quarter-over-quarter figures. "All the pieces of Sun's HPTC strategy are coming together and these numbers prove we are delivering what the market wants," said Shahin Khan, vice president of the High Performance and Technical Computing business unit at Sun. "Our technical innovations in storage, computation, graphics, software and services are taking root with customers and establishing a rock solid foundation that is setting a new standard in HPTC." Since its inception earlier this year, the HPTC group has attracted major customer wins in the government, education, life sciences, oil and gas, manufacturing and financial services segments. This momentum is building as customers look to maximize their existing resources through grid and cluster computing. Key to the business unit's long-term growth strategy is Sun's grid computing initiative, which features a multi-pronged approach to grid deployment based on building block components, extensive business partnerships and alliances. Despite shipping units only since the summer of 2003, Sun scored substantial wins with large Sun Fire(TM) V60x cluster configurations that appeared on the Top 500 Supercomputers list announced in November. The Top 500 list also revealed that deployments of clustered Sun Fire V60x servers for the Linux platform doubled due to the rapid market acceptance of the Sun Fire V60x server clusters. Additional highlights from the IDC Technical Server report include: -- Demonstrating continued customer confidence in its low-cost computing strategy, Sun outgrew the Technical Departmental segment (throughput-oriented servers with average selling prices below $250K), in revenues and shipments both year-to-year and quarter-to-quarter. The price-performance of the Sun Fire V60x and V65x servers and the Sun Fire V210 and V240 servers contributed greatly to Sun's success in this segment. -- Sun moved to the number one position in US units shipped from its number three slot last quarter. Sun is the only major vendor to perform better than the market in revenue and unit growth both year-to-year and quarter-to-quarter as well as post unit growth of over 100 percent during that same time period. For a more detailed report see the IDC High Performance Technical Computer Qview Report, 11/24/03.