F5 Joins NetApp Alliance Partner Program

F5 Joins NetApp Alliance Partner Program Joint F5 and NetApp deployments enable seamless file mobility; partners outline plans to deliver additional solutions to help customers build agile, dynamic data centers.

SEATTLE, January 21, 2010-F5 Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ: FFIV), the global leader in Application Delivery Networking, today announced that it has joined the NetApp Alliance Partner Program as an Advantage Alliance Partner. F5 is collaborating with NetApp to provide customers with unified application and data delivery solutions to enable more agile and dynamic data centers.

Working together, F5 and NetApp will help customers bridge the gap from traditional to dynamic infrastructures by increasing the flexibility between users and resources. Agile IT environments allow enterprises to respond quickly to change-adding, removing, and changing application and data services on demand. The result is a powerful IT architecture-encompassing security, access, acceleration, availability, and data management-that adapts smoothly to an organizations evolving IT requirements.

In addition to outlining a long-term strategy, F5 and NetApp are providing immediate benefits to their joint customers with initial solutions that leverage application delivery and file virtualization to unleash the power of data mobility today.

File Virtualization Delivers Transparent Data Mobility

With F5 ARX file virtualization solutions, NetApp customers will be able to automatically and transparently move data at will, dramatically reducing migration times and eliminating costly downtime.

F5s award-winning ARX solutions virtualize the file storage environment, removing the static binding between clients and storage resources. Data can move freely-even during business hours-without affecting applications or users, and without requiring client reconfiguration. In addition, the ARX policy-based management capabilities allow IT organizations to create set and forget policies to automate data movement, further simplifying management and reducing operational overhead.

Supporting Quotes

Were delighted to become part of the Alliance Partner Program, said Jim Ritchings, Vice President of Business Development at F5. NetApp and F5 have a large shared customer base that is deriving tremendous value from our solutions, so this solution partnership makes a lot of sense. NetApp is a leader in the enterprise-class NAS market, and F5 has led the way in developing solutions like ARX that create a more dynamic infrastructure and have clear ROI. Our joint solution is very compelling, and by working together we will deliver even more value to customers.

The NetApp Alliance Partner Program brings like-minded solution providers together to provide cost-effective and validated solutions to our customers to help them simplify their data infrastructure, said Patrick Rogers, Vice President, Solutions Marketing at NetApp. By joining the NetApp Alliance Partner Program, F5 will provide a complementary solution to NetApp storage that will help customers eliminate the many problems typically associated with data migration. Together, well help customers boost productivity and increase the agility of their infrastructure.

Growth of unstructured data continues to accelerate and data center administrators are tasked to optimize access, provide increased mobility, and deliver solid cost-containment benefits, said Dave Russell, Research Vice President at Gartner, Inc. Looking forward, vendors that can extend their solutions data management and virtualization capabilities through strong industry solution partnerships should rank highly on organizations wish lists.

For more information, please visit: www.f5.com/solutions/technology-alliances/infrastructure/netapp.html

About the NetApp Alliance Partner Program

The NetApp Alliance Partner Program gives qualified infrastructure and application providers access to NetApp solutions, software development kits, technical support, training, certification, product information, and marketing and sales assistance. Customers benefit by having access to best-of-breed partner solutions that are tested to work with NetApp storage. Additional information about the NetApp Alliance Partner Program is available at www.netapp.com/alliance.

About F5 Networks

F5 Networks is the global leader in Application Delivery Networking (ADN), focused on ensuring the secure, reliable, and fast delivery of applications. F5s flexible architectural framework enables community-driven innovation that helps organizations enhance IT agility and dynamically deliver services that generate true business value. F5s vision of unified application and data delivery offers customers an unprecedented level of choice in how they deploy ADN solutions. It redefines the management of application, server, storage, and network resources, streamlining application delivery and reducing costs. Global enterprise organizations, service and cloud providers, and Web 2.0 content providers trust F5 to keep their business moving forward. For more information, go to www.f5.com.

F5 and ARX are trademarks or service marks of F5 Networks, Inc., in the U.S. and other countries. All other product and company names herein may be trademarks of their respective owners.

NetApp, the NetApp logo, and Go further, faster are trademarks or registered trademarks of NetApp, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. All other brands or products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders and should be treated as such. The word partner or partnership does not imply a legal partnership relationship between NetApp and any other company.

This press release may contain forward looking statements relating to future events or future financial performance that involve risks and uncertainties. Such statements can be identified by terminology such

LINK:	http://www.netapp.com/us/company/news/press-releases/news-rel-20100121...
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