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Industry Survey Identifies Top Issues Facing IT Professionals Responsible for Managing Branch Offices

Posted on: Tuesday, 14 March 2006, 09:00 CST

SAN JOSE, Calif., March 14 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Brocade Communications Systems, Inc. (Brocade(R)) today announced the results of a survey on top issues facing IT professionals responsible for managing branch offices. The research, conducted by The Strategy Group (Englewood, Florida) in January 2006, shows that file security, IT infrastructure simplification, and application performance top the list of today's concerns for this segment of IT professionals.

The study, which was commissioned by Brocade and managed by Ziff Davis Media, assessed the key IT priorities of companies with branch and remote offices. Results of the study revealed that IT professionals face a number of challenges in striking the proper balance between data accessibility and security, application performance, and branch office IT infrastructure.

A total of 631 technology decision-makers who subscribe to ZD Media publications completed the online survey during the week of January 10 to 16, 2006. Of the group, 64 percent said they would consider remote file access to be the most important optimization function they undertake, and 84 percent of respondents said they would consider cost reduction to be the main driver behind their data consolidation efforts.

The survey found that file security, WAN bandwidth optimization, remote application performance, and "real-time" file sharing are all important IT initiatives. Half of the respondents said that they were interested in consolidating file servers at branch locations, and others said they needed to consolidate Microsoft Windows management (39 percent), print (34 percent), active directories (34 percent), and DNS (30 percent). Additionally, 77 percent of the respondents said they perform remote backups weekly and an average of 86 percent of these backups are successful. The average estimated cost to create remote backups was found to be $3,800.

"The survey findings confirm the value of products such as Brocade Tapestry(TM) WAFS, which directly addresses many of the highest-priority branch office IT issues," said Tom Buiocchi, Brocade Vice President of Worldwide Marketing and Support. "The Brocade solution meets the increasing demand from distributed organizations to improve management and security by centralizing branch office IT resources."

Brocade Tapestry Wide Area File Services (WAFS) is a high-performance consolidation and optimization solution that is designed to enable organizations to centrally manage file data without compromising speed or security for remote users across a Wide Area Network (WAN). Leveraging the Microsoft Windows platform, it is designed to provide native integration and security for branch offices using Microsoft applications and to help organizations save time and money by consolidating data in a single secure location at the data center. Consolidating data and branch office services increases the reliability of data backup and recovery, helps eliminate multiple servers and IT complexity, and improves employee productivity with faster file access and real-time collaboration.

"The survey findings make it clear that IT management has a challenge in keeping up with growth and consistently using the best technology for cost- effective, secure remote services," said Eric Elgar, Executive Editor/Strategy for Ziff Davis Media's Custom Solutions Group. "Hardware-based WAFS implementations, using a dedicated server or an appliance-like configuration such as Brocade Tapestry WAFS, are highly desirable for their performance, ease of management, security, and application-specific optimizations. This type of solution is key to addressing many of the most important initiatives that respondents to the survey named."

A ZDNet white paper based on the Brocade Branch Office Consolidation Survey is available at http://www.brocade.com/san/WP_form.jsp .

About Brocade Communications Systems, Inc.

Brocade delivers the industry's leading platforms, solutions, and services for intelligently connecting, managing, and optimizing IT resources in shared storage environments. The world's premier systems, server, and storage providers offer the Brocade SilkWorm(R) family of Storage Area Network (SAN) connectivity platforms as the foundation for shared storage in organizations of all sizes. In addition, the Brocade Tapestry family of IT infrastructure solutions extends the ability to proactively manage and optimize application and information resources across the enterprise. Using Brocade solutions, organizations are better positioned to reduce cost, manage complexity, and satisfy business compliance requirements through optimized use and management of their IT resources. For more information, visit the Brocade Web site at http://www.brocade.com/ or contact the company at info@brocade.com.

NOTE: Brocade, the Brocade B weave logo, Fabric OS, Secure Fabric OS, and SilkWorm are registered trademarks and Tapestry is a trademark of Brocade Communications Systems, Inc., in the United States and/or in other countries. FICON is a registered trademark of IBM Corporation in the United States and/or in other countries. All other brands, products, or service names are or may be trademarks or service marks of, and are used to identify, products or services of their respective owners.

Brocade Communications Systems, Inc.

CONTACT: media, Michelle Leach, +1-408-333-5319, or mleach@brocade.com,or investors, Darby Dye, +1-408-333-5752, or ddye@brocade.com; or Wendy Lewisof FS Communications, +1-650-691-1488, or wendy@fscomm.com, for BrocadeCommunications Systems, Inc.

Web site: http://www.brocade.com/

Source: PRNewswire-FirstCall

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