Dot Hill Introduces Green Storage System for the Enterprise
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CARLSBAD, Calif., Feb. 21 -- Dot Hill (NASDAQ:HILL), a market leader in providing flexible storage offerings and responsive service and support to OEMs and system integrators, today announced its new SANnet(R) II FC-G (Green) storage array.
SANnet II FC-G is an upgrade to its current SANnet II Fibre Channel (FC) technology with support for new environmental standards. Dot Hill is one of the first major storage vendors to ship Fibre Channel RAID storage products that support international standards for the RoHS (Restriction of Hazardous Substances) and WEEE (Waste for Electrical and Electronic Equipment) directives. This is the first in a series of many RoHS and WEEE compliant products from Dot Hill.
OEMs and indirect channel partners will be able to sell Dot Hill's green-friendly SANnet II FC-G globally, which will support key new standards in Europe and several Asia-Pacific markets as early as the first quarter of 2006. Other customer benefits include world-class performance, a proven field quality record and a seamless extension of the existing SANnet II FC to FC and SANnet II FC to SATA products. SANnet II FC-G has helped Sun Microsystems, Inc. set several benchmarks for outstanding performance including SPECjbb2005 (Java Business Benchmark) and the Transaction Processing Performance Council's (TPC) TPC-H benchmark.
"Dot Hill has reduced the end-of-life cost for its customers and provided a service to dispose of old storage equipment in an environmentally friendly way," said Nigel Lambert, channel director at Zycko. "It is the first company to offer storage for the enterprise that we can sell in Europe and Asia to comply with RoHS and WEEE requirements. Not only is it good for the environment, it also creates more value and options for us to do business with our IT customers worldwide."
The WEEE directive mandates that electronics providers must develop recycling programs by August 2006. The RoHS directive (effective July 1, 2006) requires that products sold within the EU maintain minimal levels of lead and cadmium.
According to IDC, a leading industry analyst firm, research shows that the size of the Fibre Channel host connected market will grow to nearly 10 billion by 2009. SANnet II FC-G demonstrates Dot Hill's continued investment in the Fibre Channel to Fibre Channel topology.
"With total external disk storage system units topping 97,000 for Q3YTD2005 in Western Europe, the storage industry can obviously make its contribution to protecting the environment," says Program Director Claus Egge, from IDC's European Storage Group. "With the announcement of the SANnet II FC-G and the RoHS and WEEE compliance, Dot Hill is making a commitment that will become increasingly important to many companies. Further, we expect environment-friendly requirements to become increasingly important in other regions." (Source, IDC, IDC European Disk Tracker, December 2005)
The target customers for SANnet II FC-G include Tier-1, Tier-2 and Tier-3 server vendors, the Intel(R) white box server Direct Attached Storage (DAS) market, telcos that require NEBS certified solutions and government agencies that require Mil-spec solutions.
The Dot Hill SANnet II FC-G:
o Ensures compliance with RoHS and WEEE regulations;
o Provides world-class performance as the winner of the SPC benchmark two years in a row;
o Supports existing and future Fibre Channel infrastructures, ensuring investment protection.
"Dot Hill welcomes the opportunity to help the environment and expand our business in our global market," said Dana Kammersgard, president of Dot Hill. "Our OEM customers and indirect partners need to be RoHS compliant by July 2006, and we are planning ahead to make it as easy as possible to comply with the EU initiatives."
Pricing and Availability
The new SANnet II FC-G will be available April 1, 2006, to help ensure global customers will have ample time to implement the systems and comply with RoHS regulations. With the same fit and form as the previous SANnet II FC product, the RoHS and WEEE compliant SANnet II FC-G will replace the SANnet II FC-FC at no additional cost. Dot Hill will comply with the second level of RoHS support, which will be implemented in 2008.
About Dot Hill
Dot Hill is the market leader in providing flexible storage offerings and responsive service and support to OEMs and system integrators, from engagement through end of life. Founded in 1984, Dot Hill has more than two decades of expertise in developing high-quality, competitively priced storage products. Focused on delivering global 24 X 7 X 365 technical support, the company has more than 100,000 systems in use worldwide and numerous OEM and indirect partners. With its patented technology and award-winning SANnet II(R) and RIO Xtreme(TM) families of storage and its Dot Hill Storage Services, Dot Hill makes storage easy. Headquartered in Carlsbad, Calif., Dot Hill has offices in China, Germany, Israel, Japan, Netherlands, United Kingdom and the United States. More information is available at www.dothill.com.
CONTACT: Linda Barger of The Ardell Group, +1-858-792-2911, linda@ardellgroup.com, for Dot Hill
