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BLUE BELL, PA -- Investment brokerage firm Commonwealth Financial Network is applying the performance and capacity of the Unisys e-@ction Enterprise Server ES7000 to improve research and reporting functions for its client base, Unisys said today. Commonwealth Financial Network, a Waltham, Mass.-based broker-dealer, will use the Unisys ES7000 server to manage a database of 50,000 client files and run key financial reports in less than 30 seconds. With shortened reporting cycle times, Commonwealth will provide its network of brokers and dealers with instantaneous access to investor activity, investor profitability and cost analysis information, so advisors can make informed business decisions and deliver faster responses to client inquiries. Commonwealth services its network of 800 independent financial planners and their staffs with day-to-day investment research, management, marketing and technology support. As the company rapidly expanded its business, the demand for financial data reporting services increased throughout the enterprise. To provide its growing client base with improved research and reporting functions, the company selected the ES7000 server to house its new data warehouse solution. As the centerpiece of a new, consolidated server environment, the Unisys ES7000 server will enable Commonwealth advisors to create advanced summary reports, check stock prices, monitor balance positions and input client data in real time. Additionally, the ES7000 server will dramatically shave hours off of reporting cycles. "For our advisors to make the most strategic business recommendations to their clients, they need access to fresh, top-of-the-hour financial news and information," said Edward S. Bell, chief information officer, Commonwealth Financial Network. "The Unisys ES7000 server provides this ammunition through 24/7 server availability and the capacity to manage mass amounts of data. Thanks to the ES7000 server, we can provide rapid and thorough financial forecasts to our clients, which is what they demand from their financial planners." To keep its IT infrastructure tight and integrated, Commonwealth will consolidate the workload of several 2- and 4-processor commodity servers with one ES7000. Commonwealth's 16-processor Unisys ES7000 will be divided into two 8-way clusters running Microsoft's SQL Server 2000. With the server's high I/O capacity and powerful partitioning capabilities, Commonwealth will be able to shift resources throughout the day to carry out large-scale reporting at night. "The ES7000 has the horsepower and bandwidth needed to service a broad array of computing demands for information-driven companies," said Peter Samson, vice president and general manager, Technology Sales Development, Unisys Corporation. "At the same time, the ES7000 allows for centralized administration, easing the burden on information technology departments and allowing companies to focus on executing their business objectives." The Unisys ES7000 is based on the Unisys Cellular MultiProcessing (CMP) server architecture, which provides an array of computing capabilities required for enterprise-class e-business computing -- capabilities that are well known to users of large-scale computers, but unprecedented in computing environments using Microsoft and Intel technology. The ES7000 was designed for the power of Intel 64-bit Itanium processors. Using CMP's powerful partitioning capabilities, Itanium and Pentium III Xeon processors can run side-by-side within one server. These and other advantages enable CMP-based servers to match the performance of UNIX systems in enterprise-class e-business and other critical applications at a fraction of the price. For more information visit www.commonwealth.com or www.unisys.com