VIEO Showcases Networking and Storage Applications over InfiniBand Architecture with Industry Leaders at Intel Developer Forum.

Business/Hi-Tech Editors

Intel Developer Forum 2002

AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 4, 2002

Company Demonstrates a Series of Industry Firsts in Latest Release

of Its End-to-end InfiniBand Software

VIEO, the InfiniBand(TM) software leader, made a series of industry breakthroughs at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in San Francisco last week by demonstrating fabric convergence of networking and storage applications working together in multi-vendor, multi-platform, VIEO-managed InfiniBand networks.

VIEO successfully deployed an IP (Internet Protocol) over InfiniBand fabric application using Intel Corporation's IBLAN technology running across their Host Channel Adapters (HCAs) and VIEO's own implementation of IBLAN running on Mellanox Technologies-based hardware. This was the first time IBLAN has been demonstrated on different InfiniBand hardware platforms. The company also demonstrated low latency enterprise database access using the Direct Access File System (DAFS) protocol over an InfiniBand connection to a Network Appliance filer and an Oracle 9i database, another industry first. VIEO's management and application software was widely featured in the IBM Microelectronics, InfiniSwitch, Mellanox Technologies and Red Switch booths at the conference and managed a multi-node, multi-vendor subnet in the Intel Unified Fabric Demonstration as well as in the company's own booth.

"We are extremely pleased with the progress and industry collaboration that we showcased with leading companies such as IBM, Intel and Network Appliance at IDF this spring," said Bob Fabbio, president and CEO of VIEO. "Our successes at IDF illustrate how rapidly InfiniBand technologies are maturing as the industry prepares for data center deployments. By working with our partners to provide best-in-class fabric management and application-enabling software, and by publishing key application programming interfaces (APIs) in the public domain, VIEO is paving the way for widespread adoption of InfiniBand Architecture-enabled solutions in the IT enterprise. We look forward to advancing these recent accomplishments in the coming months to add more industry partners, more management and application software functionality, and support for more hardware platforms, including next-generation InfiniBand silicon products."

VIEO demonstrated its fabric management software running on multiple platforms in tandem with various vendors. In the Intel Unified Fabric Demonstration, the VIEO Fabric Manager(TM) ran on a Mellanox-based InfiniBand HCA. In the VIEO booth, it ran on both Intel and Mellanox-based HCAs. The company also illustrated the high availability attributes of the InfiniBand Architecture by showing how VIEO's Subnet Manager automatically fails-over across heterogeneous platforms in the event of a catastrophic failure to preserve the integrity of the fabric and in-flight applications - another industry first. VIEO had demonstrated homogeneous fail-over at a previous IDF. To further illustrate the versatility of VIEO's solutions, the VIEO HCA and associated device driver were integrated into the IBM Microelectronics exhibit, which included IBM's InfiniBlue(TM) 4X Target Channel Adapter (TCA).

"Interoperability of InfiniBand products is critical for the technology's deployment in data centers," said Jim Pappas, director of initiative marketing for Intel's Enterprise Platform Group. "VIEO's demonstrations at IDF highlight their progress in integrating their management solutions with a wide variety of InfiniBand solutions. This work will help further the industry effort for delivery of interoperable fabrics."

"It's certainly an exciting time for InfiniBand product vendors and solution providers as more and more products are shown working successfully together," said Bruce Beers, vice president of IBM Microelectronics' Server Business Line. "We're pleased to be collaborating with companies like VIEO to demonstrate the functionality of our respective products and publicly display the benefits that this technology has to offer."

Highlighting InfiniBand Architecture's role as a converged fabric interconnect, VIEO demonstrated, in cooperation with Network Appliance, Oracle 9i database access using the DAFS protocol over an InfiniBand fabric. DAFS leverages the Remote Direct Memory Addressing (RDMA) capabilities of the InfiniBand Architecture to implement a low latency, high performance storage transport. This was the first time a database application using DAFS over InfiniBand has been demonstrated.

"Network Appliance is encouraged with the progress we are making with VIEO to show DAFS over InfiniBand implementations," said David Dale, Industry Evangelist at Network Appliance. "DAFS over an InfiniBand fabric promises to dramatically enhance the speed, efficiency, and manageability of enterprise applications in data center environments. Industry collaboration with companies such as VIEO is an integral part of ensuring that DAFS becomes a standard protocol for enterprise storage networking."

The sheer number of vendors participating in the InfiniBand Trade Association pavilion at IDF further evidenced the swell of InfiniBand industry momentum. VIEO's software managed 1X (2.5 Gigabits/sec. link speed) and 4X (10 Gigabits/sec.) components from Compaq, Dell, Essential Technologies, IBM, InfiniSwitch, Intel Corporation, Mellanox Technologies, Network Appliance, Primarion, OmegaBand, RedSwitch and Voltaire. The topology of the VIEO-managed subnets was visualized using PATROL(R) from BMC Software, VisualSAN(TM) from Prisa Networks, and the VIEO FabricView management console.

About VIEO, Inc.

VIEO, Inc. was established in May 2000 to deliver InfiniBand software products. The company's engineering roots are in high performance systems and it is now focused on being the single source provider of a complete software stack to enable and exploit the InfiniBand switched fabric input/output architecture.

VIEO's platform neutral software products, VIEO Fabric Manager and VIEO FabricView, are being developed and integrated with OEM partner products to provide robust InfiniBand solutions for tomorrow's data centers. VIEO is also developing critical transport software that will enable enterprise applications to exploit InfiniBand. To assist its partners' software development, integration and testing efforts, VIEO licenses a Software Developer Kit - a reference platform including PCI-InfiniBand adapter cards and the complete VIEO software stack.

The company is a member of the InfiniBand Trade Association, helping further develop the standard and promote vendor interoperability through active participation in six of its working groups. The company is also a founding member of The Open Group's Interconnect Software Consortium, dedicated to developing and promoting software specifications that will enable successful deployment of fast interconnects in IT enterprises. In 2001, VIEO received $24 million in Series A funding from the Audax Group, BMC Software, Dell, Eyes of Texas Partners, OneLiberty Ventures and TL Ventures. The company's name is derived from the Latin word meaning "weave together."

For more information, visit www.vieo.com.

All marks are the property of their respective owners.