SUN AND SYSTEMS PARTNERS
REACH KEY MILESTONE AHEAD
OF SCHEDULE FOR SOLARIS
SOFTWARE ON MERCED PROCESSOR
PALO ALTO, Calif., - January 11, 1999 -- Reaching a key milestone well ahead
of schedule, Sun Microsystems, Inc. - working closely with its systems partners
including Fujitsu Limited, NCR Corporation, Siemens AG, and Toshiba Corporation
- announced it has delivered Solaris on the Intel IA-64 Pre-silicon Software Development
Environment using the Merced architecture.
"Sun has successfully completely the intial port of the Solaris Operating Environment
to Merced in only 9 months," said Rich Green, Vice President, Sun Microsystems.
"Because the Solaris code base fully supports 64-bit computing and is almost
completely platform independent, we have been able to port Solaris to the IA-64
Pre-Silicon Software Development Environment in record time."
This initial implementation of Solaris on Merced provides backward compatibility
for existing Solaris Intel IA-32 applications. Sun expects to be supporting select
ISVs and its Intel System Partners with a full 64-bit development environment in
an Early Access release of Solaris on the Merced processor in the first half of
1999. Sun intends to optimize the Solaris Operating Environment to fully utilized
the Merced features and capabilities at the time of Merced-based system availability.
"Solaris running on the IA-64 Pre-silicon Software Development Environment
represents a key milestone for the Solaris IA-64 operating system", said Mike
Pope, Director of Server Software Programs, Intel Corporation. "This is an
indicator of the strong industry-wide momentum behind the Merced architecture, and
we look forward to continuing this progress with Sun."
Investment Protection With 32-bit Compatibility
To protect customer investments, the Solaris Operating Environment will provide
full compatibility on Merced for the more than 3,200 Solaris on Intel applications
that are available today. This means that ISVs with applications that do not require
64-bit addressing or the full Merced performance do not have to change or recompile
their existing 32-bit Solaris on Intel applications to take advantage of Merced.
"By pairing the Solaris 7 operating environment with NCR's industry-leading
Intel-based WorldMark server technology as the foundation, we are able to offer
our customers around the world a scalable, reliable and secure environment on which
to build mission-critical applications," said Vice President, Global Alliance
Partners for NCR Corporation. "This combination of 'best-of-breed' technologies
is further evidence of NCR's commitment to provide customers with industry-specific
Data Warehousing and Customer Interaction Solutions that are portable and work in
today's open systems computing environment. And, the flexibility of Solaris on Merced
will support new 64-bit applications as well as existing 32-bit applications - a
critical element for our customers as they inevitably grow."
Advance 64-bit Development Tools Available Today
Today, Sun provides a complete 64-bit operating environment. Sun supports
the development of 64-bit applications today with the Solaris 7 Operating Environment
running on 64-bit Sun systems.
The Solaris Application Programming Interface (API) and Device Driver Interface
(DDI) are common across all Solaris platforms. This means that ISVs who develop
64-bit applications today on Solaris can easily migrate these same applications
to the Merced platform by simply recompiling their application or driver. By offering
multiple, source code compatible 64-bit platforms, customers and ISVs gain access
to Solaris 64-bit technology today, and the flexibility of multiple platforms in
the future.
The Sun Visual WorkShopTM 5.0 C++ and the Sun Performance WorkShop 5.0 Fortran products
are in broad use today for 64-bit application development. These 64-bit software
development tools will also be available on both IA-32 and IA-64 platforms to support
64-bit application development for the Solaris on Merced beta programs.
"The availability today of a complete 64-bit Solaris platform along with Solaris
on IA-32 allows Oracle to leverage our extensive past work with Sun to optimize
Oracle applications on Solaris platforms. This minimizes our development costs and
decreases our time to market. Our customers and partners, including Siemens, NCR,
Fujitsu and Toshiba, ultimately benefit since they will quickly receive access to
Oracle products and technology on Solaris IA-64 systems as they become available,"
said Ray Wong, Vice President, Systems Products Division, Oracle Corporation.
"We're glad to see that Solaris for the Merced processor is ahead of schedule,"
said Junji Maeyama, Member of the Board and Group President of Fujitsu's Software
Group. "Solaris provides one of the most advanced networking environments and
our customers can enjoy its high performance, scalability, reliability and security
on Fujitsu's Intel servers."
"This is an excellent achievement and a critical milestone in making the Solaris
Operating Environment available on the Merced platform on schedule", said Bernd
Puschendorf, Vice President Marketing, Computer Systems Division of Siemens. "For
all Siemens server platforms, Intel's IA-64 is the strategic architecture and we
are preparing the future now.7quot;
Puschendorf added, "The technology partnership with Sun has proven to create
results in record time and Siemens will continue to contribute to the Solaris development.
We plan to take the lead in bringing Solaris on IA-64 to the market and will ensure
an easy transition to this technology for our Unix customers worldwide. The Siemens
European Solaris Development Center supports the partners in providing their applications
on Intel-based Solaris and we are already working with our partners including SAP,
Baan, Oracle and Informix to make their solutions available on that attractive environment."
"We've been working closely with Sun to reach this milestone," said Kaoru
Kubo, Vice President & Group Executive, Info/Communication Platform & Products
Group, Toshiba Corporation. "We expect that Solaris on the Intel IA-64 Pre-silicon
Software Development Environment will provide the end-customers with the opportunity
to timely enjoy further growth and diversification on our Intel architecture based
servers. And, Toshiba's clustering software DNCWARE on Solaris Operating Environment
for the Intel's Merced processor will meet the increasing demand of users requiring
reliable and scalable access to all types of data for mission critical applications."
Sun completed optimization of its 64-bit Solaris Operating Environment on the Intel
IA-64 Pre-silicon Software Development Environment for the Merced processor in November
1998.
Solaris 7 Product Line
For SPARCTM and Intel computers, the new Solaris 7 product line provides full
binary compatibility with previous releases of Solaris software, enhanced Windows
NT interoperability, ease-of-administration and mainframe-class capabilities.
About Fujitsu Limited
Founded in 1935, Fujitsu Limited is an international leader in information technology,
telecommunications, semiconductors and other electronics devices. The Fujitsu Group
of over 400 technology, software and service companies posted global revenues of
more than $36 billion in the fiscal year ended March 31, 1997. Fujitsu can be found
on the World Wide Web at http://www.fujitsu.co.jp/index-e.html.
About NCR Corporation
NCR Corporation (NYSE: NCR) is in the business of transforming transactions into
relationships. NCR is a recognized world leader in data warehousing solutions, ATMs,
point-of-sale, high performance scanners, and support services for retail, financial
and national accounts markets. NCR's business solutions are built on the foundation
of the company's long-established industry knowledge and consulting expertise, value-adding
software, global customer support services, a complete line of consumable and media
products, and world-leading hardware technology. More information about NCR and
its products may be found on the World Wide Web at www.ncr.com
About the Computer Systems Division of Siemens
Siemens' new Information and Communication Products Group rolled out
its business on October 1, 1998. With sales totaling nearly DM 20 billion, a global
workforce of 34,000 and manufacturing locations around the globe, Information and
Communication Products offers the entire product range of IT and communications
from a single source: These products range from mobile and fixed network phones
to ISDN devices, PCs, notebooks, servers and mainframes all the way to retail and
self-service systems. Communication cables and IT services complement the portfolio.
The new Group is divided into five separate divisions. The Computer Systems Division
maintains a comprehensive product portfolio to cater for the requirements of personal
computing and enterprise computing. Business PCs, mobile computers, workstations
and consumer PCs address the different market segments in the PC sector with tailor-made
products. With its innovative Primergy NT server family, the RM line of highly scalable
Unix servers, and its successful BS2000/OSD mainframes, the Computer Systems Division
of Siemens is strategically positioned for the markets of the future with best-in-class
products.
About Toshiba Corporation
Based in Tokyo, Toshiba Corporation is a world leader in electronic
technology. With over 187,000 employees worldwide and annual sales of over $40 billion,
Toshiba is an integrated manufacturer of products spanning information and communications
systems, information media and consumer products, electronic components, and power
systems and industrial equipment.
About Sun Microsystems
Since its inception in 1982, a singular vision, "The Network Is The ComputerTM,"
has propelled Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ: SUNW), to its position as a leading
provider of high quality hardware, software and services for establishing enterprise-wide
intranets and expanding the power of the Internet. With more than $10 billion in
annual revenues, Sun can be found in more than 150 countries and on the World Wide
Web at http://www.sun.com.
Sun, the Sun logo, Sun Microsystems, Solaris and "The
Network is the Computer" are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems,
Inc. in the United States and other countries.
All other names may be trademarks of their respective owners.
Unix is a registered trademark in the United States and other countries, exclusively
licensed through X/Open Company, Ltd.
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