EMC PARTNERS WITH ORACLE, SYBASE AND INFORMIX TO HELP CUSTOMERS LEVERAGE THEIR BIGGEST HIDDEN ASSET: INFORMATION; EMC Develops Open Storage Business Solutions for Large Commercial Databases.

SAN FRANCISCO --(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 14, 1995 -- EMC Corporation, the leading supplier of large computer data storage systems, today announced it is working with each of the world's three leading independent database software providers -- Oracle Corp., Sybase Inc., and Informix Corp. -- to enable customers to significantly enhance their ability to leverage large amounts of information for competitive advantage using open systems technology.

"This announcement marks a generational next step in commercial open systems computing," said Michael C. Ruettgers, EMC President and CEO, at a news conference in San Francisco today. "Today's corporations demand fast, constant access to immense amounts of business information to produce revenue and increase efficiency. Applications such as data warehousing, decision support and online transaction processing (OLTP) are enabling companies to successfully use large amounts of operational information in new ways." Companies that once only used data for retrospective purposes, such as determining payment of bills, are now utilizing their data for predictive, competitive purposes, such as finding new customers and markets.

"The mantra of the 1990s is 'Getting close to your customer', and with massive amounts of data on bigger and bigger customer pools, the prospect of 'getting close' seems a strain," said Neal Waddington, Senior Vice President and General Manager of EMC's Open Storage Group. "The fact is, in a business climate that is increasingly complex, companies must truly understand the nuances of their customers' behavior. Our partnerships enable customers to meet this critical need through open systems technology."

Responding effectively to customer needs is prompting companies to demand better performance from the information systems that give them valuable insights about their customers. And EMC's leadership in information storage and retrieval technology is a result of providing the industry's best-performing storage solutions. EMC's Integrated Cached Disk Array technology combines large amounts of electronic cache memory with high-capacity, small form-factor disk drives to give customers unprecedented access and availability to mission-critical information. EMC's work with these three leading database companies is the result of technical discussions and developments. Mutual customers running applications from Informix, Oracle and Sybase have realized significant performance increases utilizing EMC ICDA systems.

"We have also tested these database applications in our labs and documented results that show performance two to four times faster on Symmetrix 3000 than with conventional storage technologies -- without tuning or customizing the software," said Waddington.

Oracle

Oracle recognizes the need to leverage the movement of technology into the realm of the intelligent storage system. Oracle believes EMC's ICDA technology will greatly enhance the productivity and effectiveness of its database customers, particularly in the areas of very large databases (VLDBs) and data warehousing.

"As the leading supplier of large data warehousing software, Oracle believes the new Symmetrix 3000 ICDA systems provide the capacity and performance features that today's data warehousing applications depend on, particularly in the areas of centralized, large repositories, with business-critical data storage requirements," said Jerry Held, Senior Vice President, Server Technologies at Oracle. "This is the area in which Oracle's parallel server solutions are most effective. While EMC's Symmetrix 3000 systems are new to the market, we have already observed impressive performance results at some mutual customer sites."

EMC and Oracle are business partners and have signed a technology exchange. EMC is also a member of Oracle's Business Alliance Programme (BAP).

Oracle Corporation, headquartered in Redwood Shores, California, is the world's leading supplier of information management software. Oracle develops and markets Oracle Media Server and the Oracle7 family of software products for database management; Developer/2000 and Designer/2000, tools for enterprise-wide, client/server solutions for commercial accounting, manufacturing, distribution, government accounting, human resources and project control. Oracle software runs on personal digital assistants, set-top devices, PCs, workstations, minicomputers, mainframes, and massively parallel computers. The company offers its products, along with related consulting, education, and support services, in more than 90 countries around the world.

Sybase

In addition to the numerous mutual customers that are taking advantage of the Sybase and EMC technologies, Sybase currently has the EMC Symmetrix product installed in its Emeryville Open Solutions Labs. "Early feedback from our mutual customers indicates that the Sybase-EMC combination is a high performance solution for the distributed enterprise," said David Sohm, Vice President of Channels and Partner Marketing. "Businesses are building enterprise-wide client/server architectures that run in heterogeneous environments. Our partnership with EMC supports Sybase's objective to deliver an open, adaptive framework for customers and partners that is optimized for both OLTP and data warehousing environments. Customers in the financial, retail and communications sectors, in particular, require uncompromised data availability, application reliability and total systems performance to maintain their competitive advantage and provide service to their clients. The combination of EMC open storage with Sybase solutions maximizes our mutual customers' value in the technology and gives them that competitive edge."

Sybase, Inc., is a worldwide leader in client/server software. Sybase is focused in the four major client/server categories: databases, tools, database systems management and interoperability, providing desktop-to-enterprise scalability. The company's mission is to provide its customers with an open, adaptable information systems architecture that enables rapid business change. Headquartered in Emeryville, CA, Sybase is the seventh-largest independent software company in the world.

Informix

"At Informix, we believe that selecting the right technology on which to build your business is essential to the operational bottom line and the future of our customers," said Steven Sommer, Vice President of Marketing at Informix. "The introduction of the EMC Symmetrix 3000 ICDA will enhance our customers' ability to accommodate VLDBs and large numbers of individual users on heterogeneous, open systems platforms in one centralized, intelligent storage subsystem. It effectively addresses clients who need immediate response to often resource-intensive, complex database queries."

Informix and EMC have signed a Letter Of Understanding to collaborate on testing and tuning their mutual products for performance and scalability for the VLDB market. In addition, the two companies have agreed to a mutual technology exchange to further leverage each other's unique product strengths.

Informix Software is the leading supplier of high-performance, parallel processing database technology for open systems. The company's database servers are the number one choice of computer hardware manufacturers for publishing Transaction Processing Council (TPC) benchmarks for UNIX-based systems. Informix products also include application development tools for creating client/server production applications, decision support systems and ad-hoc query interfaces, and connectivity software that allows information to be shared transparently from PCs to mainframes within the corporate computing environment. Informix's corporate headquarters is based in Menlo Park, California.

EMC Corporation, headquartered in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, is a world leader in enterprise-wide information storage and retrieval technology, designing systems for mainframe, midrange and open system computing environments. EMC has offices worldwide and trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol EMC. -0-

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CONTACT: EMC Corporation

Mark Fredrickson or Rick Lacroix, 508/435-1000