Unified Fabric Architecture from BLADE Network Technologies

Editor's Notes

• #2: A Fabric is the glue that connects the various pieces of equipment in the data center – servers, storage, security appliances, backup devices etc.The problem with today’s fabrics is that there are too many – InfiniBand for server to server connectivity; Fibre Channel for server to storage connectivity, and Ethernet for server to client connectivity and Ethernet for the managing the various devices.Too many fabrics means high cost; they’re complex to set up; too much cable clutter; too much power; armies of people required to operate and trouble shoot; and as a result – very high cost of ownership.With enterprises are staring at the impending reality of deploying 5x-10x has many physical servers and another order of magnitude more virtual servers to run their business – the cost and complexity of having multiple specialty fabrics increases exponentially. Its simply not tenable.UFA solves that problem; it converges multiple fabric types to a Unified Ethernet FabricArchitecture. That is our second announcement today.
• #4: Today, UFA comprises a compelling portfolio of ultra high reliability Ethernet switches highly optimized for the data center, smart server control and Advanced Fabric Management software, vNIC fabric convergence technology, VMready network virtualization software that is hypervisor agnostic, and a fabric OS that has successfully stood the test of time and the most difficult of datacenter workloads. UFA enables customers to deploy their IT infrastructure a rack-at-a-time vs. a server or storage element at a time. We call this replicated rack deployment model – “Rackonomics”.
• #7: Well, we’re not going to stop there. We have an incredibly powerful roadmap for UFA that includes the following 5 elements:Silicon innovations – we are working with the world’s leading switch silicon providers to embed functions into these ASICs that will enhance the performance, latency, thruput, and capabilities of these ASICs and make them even better for the most advanced data center workloadsWe’re going to extend our SmartServerControl software suite to delivery the most sophisticated and complete multi-vendor and multi-form factor rack and datacenter-level CMBD softwareWe’re going to add capabilities to our fabric that will make it even more resilient to failures thereby enabling dramatic reductions in TCO for our customersWe’re going to speed up the fabric to 40GE and 100GE and do so while setting new price-performance records that will shake up the industry.And we’re going to aggressively build our ecosystem of partners – technology partners, integrators, distributors, and resellers – so together we can provide customers with the most optimal and innovative data center solutions that (a) are open don’t lock them into a single vendor solution, and (b) leverage the investment our customers have already made over the years in their infrastructure.Thank you for your patience and understanding this morning.
• #8: So as you can see from these last few slides – we have some incredible proof points that establish the credibility of UFA and how we’re gaining a lot of traction in the market; and that probably explains why we’re so excited.
• #9: BLADE makes no warranties regarding the accuracy of this information. BLADE does not warrant or represent that it will introduce any product to which the information relates. It is presented for discussion purposes only. All statements regarding BLADE’s future direction and intent are subject to change or withdrawal without notice, at BLADE’s sole discretion. Prices, delivery dates and technical specifications are subject to change without notice.  Copyright 2010 BLADE Network Technologies. BLADE Network Technologies, the BLADE logo, BLADEHarmony, RackSwitch, SmartConnect and VMready are trademarks of BLADE Network Technologies.  All other names or marks are property of their respective owners.