AVAKI's Grid Software Selected as a Core Technology for the North Carolina BioGrid.

Business Editors, High Tech Writers

CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 4, 2002

NC BioGrid Strives to Accelerate Scientific Discovery;

Serves as a Model for Other State-wide and

Regional Scientific Research Efforts

AVAKI Corporation, a pioneer in global grid software, today announced that its grid software will power the North Carolina Bioinformatics Grid (NC BioGrid).

AVAKI's technology will provide researchers and educators with a unified research environment that greatly simplifies and improves their ability to share computing and data resources as well as software for mining, analyzing and modeling biological data. MCNC, a North Carolina nonprofit corporation responsible for architecting, building, and operating the NC BioGrid, selected AVAKI for its unique combination of commercially available data and compute grid capabilities, built-in security features, and speed of deployment.

Members of the North Carolina Genomics and Bioinformatics Consortium (NCGBC), a group of over 70 academic and commercial organizations created the NC BioGrid to provide a computing, data storage and networking infrastructure that allows researchers and educators throughout North Carolina to take full advantage of the genomic revolution. The NC BioGrid combines genomic, proteomic, and related data from across the world with hardware and software provided by the North Carolina Supercomputing Center (NCSC), the North Carolina Research and Education Network (NCREN), and the NC Network Applications Center (NCNAC).

AVAKI's grid software masks the tremendous complexity associated with managing data at multiple locations, stored on different types of hardware, and protected by varying security models. By masking the complexity, AVAKI delivers a unified research environment where scientists can focus on their research and IT departments' administrative burdens are significantly reduced.

AVAKI Gets NC BioGrid Up and Running.

The first phase of the NC BioGrid project is the building of a Testbed, a dedicated grid infrastructure incorporating all the heterogeneous platforms across geographic areas represented by the NC BioGrid participants. For the Testbed, AVAKI's software will provide:

-- Seamless access to data and computing resources across hardware platforms,
administrative domains, and geographies;

-- Built-in security designed to support a range of authentication and access
controls; and

-- Support for heterogeneous hardware, operating systems, load management and
queuing systems, along with application software uniquely envisioned for NC
BioGrid's needs.

"The Testbed is not a grid research project, but the development of a production grid that will become the single most important resource for North Carolina-based scientists and researchers," said Phil Emer, chief architect, NC BioGrid. "We selected AVAKI as the core grid technology provider because it is the only company offering a commercially-available product that met our requirements. In addition, we were very impressed by the ease and speed of installation and deployment. The initial prototype was operational in just one day."

"We believe the partnership between NC BioGrid and AVAKI represents a true milestone in biological research," said Dr. Thomas Dunning, vice president, High-performance Computing and Communications, MCNC. "This grid will harness and provide access to the power that researchers need to accelerate scientific discovery, and will serve as a model for other state-wide and regional scientific research efforts."

"By participating in the early stages of the NC BioGrid, AVAKI is well positioned to help other state-wide, regional or even national biogrid initiatives," said David Fish, president and CEO, AVAKI. "Additionally, this effort will be a valuable interoperability testing ground for the merging of Web services and grid software, the precursor and underpinning to a commercially-viable utility computing model."

About AVAKI:

AVAKI Corporation offers the first commercial grid software solution to provide highly secure, wide-area access to processing, data and application resources in a single, uniform operating environment. The flagship product, AVAKI 2.1, allows enterprises to capitalize on the true power of grid computing and thereby accelerate time to market, and increase ROI on existing computing infrastructure. Backed by Polaris Venture Partners, General Catalyst, and Sofinnova, AVAKI is located in Cambridge, Mass. For more information, please visit www.avaki.com or email [e-mail].

About MCNC:

MCNC is a nonprofit corporation that offers cost-effective access to advanced electronic and information technologies and services for businesses, state and federal government agencies and North Carolina's education communities. MCNC operates EMC (Environmental Modeling Center), a Materials and Electronic Technologies division, and a High Performance Computing and Communications division that provides high-end computing and networking resources to the state's universities. Additional information on MCNC can be found at www.mcnc.org.

About NCGBC:

The North Carolina Genomics and Bioinformatics Consortium was established in December 2000 by the NC Biotechnology Center to help meet the challenges and take advantage of the opportunities posed by the revolution in genomics. The consortium is made up of universities, biological science and IT companies, foundations, and nonprofit organizations. Additional information on NCGBC, including a complete listing of members, can be found at www.ncgbc.org.

About NC BioGrid:

A project of MCNC and the NCGBC, the NC BioGrid will accumulate the vast library of genomics, proteomics, and related data being created throughout the world, combine it with non-proprietary data from Consortium members, and make this invaluable collection of data available to researchers and educators throughout North Carolina. The NC BioGrid will also make available high-performance computing hardware and software to mine, analyze, and model this data and a high-speed network to move the data sets among Consortium sites. For more information, please visit www.ncbiogrid.org.