EMC Inks Brocade 10GbE Reseller Deal

EMC has moved to improve data center efficiency by reselling Brocade's IP networking portfolio of 10-Gigabit Ethernet switching products.

The deal, announced at EMC World this week, builds on the companies' existing strategic partnership. An interesting sideline of the deal is that it likely scotches longstanding reports that Brocade would be acquired by HP, EMC's rival in the booming data center and cloud computing market.

The deal also demonstrates the agnostic relationships that are developing in data centers: EMC has a close relationship with Cisco and has reported it plans to offer Cisco Nexus 10-GbE switch products to data center customers, too. And Brocade has longstanding partnerships with other leading data center providers including IBM and HP to supply their products to their customers.

"Virtualization and cloud computing are driving high-performance Ethernet adoption and convergence in the data center," said Ken Cheng, VP of Brocade's infrastructure products division, in a statement. "This joint expertise will help enable our customers to streamline their migration toward high-performance virtualization, data center convergence and cloud infrastructures."

The new agreement calls for Brocade to offer its Brocade FCX Series switches with 1-GbE switches built for virtual data centers. Also included in the deal will be Brocade TurboIron 24X switches and Brocade NetIron MLX Series, which provide 10-GbE and 1-GbE solutions with capabilities for data center bridging with converged enhanced Ethernet. These products, too, are targeted for use in virtualized data centers.

Other Brocade products offered through the deal include its NetIron CES 2000 Series of 10-GbE edge switches and Brocade ServerIron ADX application delivery controllers, which utilize application intelligence for on-demand elastic data center computing.

Brocade and EMC said Brocade's support services will be available to EMC customers using Brocade products.