Burlington Coat Factory Selects Topspin for Server Virtualization; Topspin Solution Cuts Costs in Half, Doubles Application Performance for Leading National Retailer.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

BURLINGTON, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 5, 2004

Topspin Communications, the leader in switched computing, today announced that Burlington Coat Factory, one of the nation's largest department store retail chains, has selected Topspin's server switches and new VFrame(TM) server virtualization software to provide the infrastructure for its on-demand data center. Burlington is leveraging the Topspin solution to reduce costs while increasing application performance and scalability by moving from proprietary systems to an open, standards-based utility computing solution.

The Topspin solution enables Burlington to:

-- Create virtual servers on-demand out of industry standard

server and storage resources

-- Reduce time to deploy new applications from days to minutes or

seconds

-- Re-purpose servers instantly from one function to another

-- Cut capital costs in half by consolidating and centrally

managing I/O and storage

-- Double Oracle application performance using InfiniBand with

RDMA 

-- Respond rapidly to server or network failures dramatically

reducing downtime

The solution is being deployed initially in support of an Oracle 10G database implementation to take advantage of the native InfiniBand performance and Grid capabilities built into Oracle 10G. Burlington is deploying the solution on top of diskless IBM xSeries x345 servers running SuSE Linux. The application/OS images and application data is centrally stored in Hitachi storage.

A Topspin 360 Server Switch with Ethernet and Fibre Channel gateways provides the backbone for the solution, connecting the Oracle database and application servers together and providing them with access to the corporate LANs and SANs. Topspin's VFrame server virtualization software allows the server switch to be programmed with the policies it needs to determine when and how to cross-connect the CPU, storage, and I/O components together to create virtual servers out of shared resources.

"Topspin's server virtualization solution gives us all of the advantages of a utility data center, plus standards-based price/performance, significant scalability, and the flexibility to choose our own servers and storage," said Mike Prince, CIO, Burlington Coat Factory. "To meet our growing application requirements with reduced spending, we required a solution that combined the price/performance curves of commodity components with the ability to do more with less."

"As large data centers face increased pressure to do more with less, we see a natural migration from proprietary systems to open standards," said Stu Aaron, vice president of Marketing for Topspin. "Topspin's open virtualization products allow forward-looking companies like Burlington to reduce their costs of doing business and increase their flexibility without being locked into a single vendor."

Headquartered in Burlington, New Jersey, Burlington Coat Factory is an industry leader in IT operations, with data centers providing IT services for over 325 stores in 42 states nationwide. Burlington Coat Factory is one of the nation's leading off-price retailer of first quality apparel, shoes and accessories for the entire family, linens and home decor, and baby clothing and merchandise.

About Topspin

Topspin is a leader in server virtualization, delivering the industry's first programmable server switch -- a new category of data center infrastructure designed to allow virtual servers to be created by interconnecting server, storage, and networking resources on-demand. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, Topspin delivers a compelling return on investment by promoting resource flexibility, and dramatically reducing equipment and management costs. Topspin products and technology are integral parts of solutions offered by leading system vendors including Dell, HP, IBM, NEC, RLX, and Sun. Additional information can be found at http://www.topspin.com or by calling 866-TOPSPIN.

Topspin is a registered trademark and the Topspin logo Topspin Switched Computing System, and VFrame are trademarks of Topspin Communications, Inc. Other company, product, or service names are the property of their respective owners.