HP 9000 N-Class Servers Speed Processing and Refunds, Making It Less Taxing for the IRS to Achieve Throughput Goals.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 14, 2000

Servers Offer Built-in Redundancy,

Upgradeability to IA-64, PA-RISC Processors

Hewlett-Packard Company today announced that the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has installed eight HP 9000 N4000 Enterprise Servers to drive the scanning and data validation of forms and federal tax deposits at its five automated service centers in Austin, Texas; Cincinnati; Memphis, Tenn.; Kansas City, Mo.; and Ogden, Utah. The centers handle up to $1 billion in deposits every day and process up to four million 1040EZ and 1099 forms per week during peak tax season.

Enhanced Image-processing Throughput

The N-Class servers have enhanced throughput for image processing that is up to five times faster than before, and report generation is now 10 times faster. Each center has a four-processor N4000 server, and the remaining three N4000 servers are used for testing and development. The IRS' Service Center Recognition Image Processing System (SCRIPS) is designed and administered by Logicon, a Northrop Grumman Company, of Herndon, Va.

"The previous processors were limited in the functions that they could perform and couldn't handle input from all the high-volume scanners concurrently, so the overall SCRIPS system could not run at full capacity," said Judy Thomas, SCRIPS project manager at the IRS. "This created delays during peak processing periods and limited the productivity of operators and scanners.

"The enhanced performance provided by the N-Class servers and the HP-UX(1) 11 operating environment allows us to simultaneously speed processing of tax deposits and forms. The N-Class servers are another step in supporting the overall IRS objective to provide taxpayers who file 1040EZ forms with faster refunds, and the government may gain added interest revenues on its monies through faster processing of Federal Tax Deposits."

Because of the critical need to ensure rapid deposit of federal funds, the IRS obtained both Personalized System Support (PSS) and Critical Systems Support (CSS) for hardware from HP. As part of these service contracts, HP ensures that its servers will be back in full operation within six hours of any problem.

Logicon and the IRS said they selected the N-Class server because of its performance, upgradeability and reliability. "This server offers us up to twice the performance of any other server in this price range," said Steve Vivirito, SCRIPS program director for Logicon. "Built-in redundancy supports high system availability, which is a priority due to the mission-critical nature of the SCRIPS workload. Support for an in-chassis upgrade to future IA-64 and PA-RISC(2) processors was an important factor in our decision."

In August 1998, IRS managers asked Logicon to begin evaluating new servers. "Their directive was to evaluate and select a server platform, conduct detailed testing, and go into full production by the middle of October 1999," said Vivirito.

Logicon became involved in the N-Class program under non-disclosure. The first server was delivered for testing April 13, 1999. Each N-Class server is configured with two fault-tolerant, high-performance HP AutoRAID disk-array systems, as well as DVD-ROM drives and DAT tape drives.

A three-month pilot was conducted and benchmark results established. Implementation began in August and was completed by the middle of October.

"We were extremely concerned about achieving this aggressive schedule. HP was able to meet the requirements with a new server family that provided us with increased functionality," said Vivirito.

"The installations went perfectly, so there was nothing to discuss. We couldn't have been more pleased," said Thomas.

"The fact that the IRS has chosen our N-Class servers to process the millions of tax returns it receives each year really showcases the robustness of HP's N-Class solution to provide the scalability, manageability and outright performance this kind of environment demands," said Patrick Rogers, worldwide marketing manager for HP's Business Critical Computing Business Unit.

About HP

Hewlett-Packard Company -- a leading global provider of computing and imaging solutions and services for business and home -- is focused on capitalizing on the opportunities of the Internet and the proliferation of electronic services.

HP plans to launch Agilent Technologies as an independent company by mid-calendar 2000. Agilent consists of HP's test and measurement, semiconductor products, chemical analysis and healthcare solutions businesses, and has leading positions in multiple market segments.

HP has 83,200 employees worldwide and had total revenue from continuing operations of $42.4 billion in its 1999 fiscal year. Information about HP, its products and the company's Year 2000 program can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.hp.com.

(1) HP-UX Release 10.20 and later and HP-UX Release 11.0 and later (in both 32 and 64-bit configurations) on all HP 9000 computers are Open Group UNIX 95 branded products.

(2) PA-RISC stands for Precision Architecture-reduced-instruction-set computing.