Brocade Communications Systems

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Brocade Communications Systems, Inc.
Image:BrocadeLogo_TM.png
Type Public (NASDAQ: BRCD)
Founded 1995
Headquarters San Jose, California, USA
Key people Michael Klayko, CEO
Industry Networking Hardware and Software
Products Fibre Channel switches and directors, FAN solutions, SAN extension and routing, SAN management applications
Revenue $750.6 million USD (2006)
Employees 1,440
Website www.brocade.com

Brocade Communications Systems, Inc. NASDAQ: BRCD, based in Silicon Valley, designs, manufactures, and sells storage networking solutions and management applications for storage area networks (SANs) and file area networks (FANs). For over ten years, Brocade has been a major influence in promoting the growth of SANs through the innovation of fibre channel switches and directors.

Contents

[edit] Corporate History

Brocade was founded in August 1995 by Paul Bonderson, Dave Banks (Systems and ASICs), Paul Ramsey (Software) and Kumar Malavalli (Standards and Technology). Brocade released its first Fibre Channel switch, the SilkWorm 1000, in 1997 based on the Stitch ASIC and their own Fabric Operating System (FabricOS or FOS).

In 1998, Gregory Reyes joined the company as CEO. During the next three years of the dot-com boom and bust, Brocade released its next generation of switches and directors based on the LOOM ASIC. In 2001, Brocade released the SilkWorm 6400 with an integrated management application, Fabric Manager 1.0.

From 2001 to 2003, Brocade released numerous switches based on its next generation ASIC, the BLOOM (Big LOOM). Brocade integrated this 2 Gb ASIC into its first director, the SilkWorm 12000, in April of 2002. This director, based on FabricOS v3.x, offered up to 128 ports and supported hot code load starting in October of 2003.

In 2004, the BLOOM II improved on the previous ASIC design by reducing cost and die size, and it powered Brocade’s second generation director, the SilkWorm 24000. The SilkWorm 24000 supports up to 128 ports in a single domain and speeds of 2 Gbits/sec across non-blocking ports.

In 2005, Gregory Reyes stepped down as CEO after being accused of backdating stock option grants. After investigating these allegations, the US Attorney’s Office, the SEC, and the FBI filed criminal and civil charges against Reyes.

Michael Klayko was named CEO in January 2005. Klayko joined Brocade in 2003 as a result of their acquisition of Rhapsody Networks, where he served as its CEO and President. Under his leadership in 2006, Brocade became the first to market with 4 Gb embedded switches, edge switches, and directors based on the Condor ASIC. Brocade continued its innovation with the new director, the SilkWorm 48000. This director has up to 384 ports, offers speeds up to 4 Gbits/sec, and introduces NPIV along with other new enhancements to the Fibre Channel switching market.

These new products helped fuel the company’s steady revenue growth in 2006. On January 29, 2007, Brocade launched a corporate-wide rebranding effort and completed its biggest acquisition to date by acquiring McDATA Corporation, one of its leading competitors in the fibre channel switch and director market.

[edit] Market Share and Leadership

The SilkWorm 12000 Director, first announced in March of 2001, quickly gained over one-third of the director market share after its release in 2002. During this initial growth in the director market, Brocade gained the confidence of some of the toughest customers in the world by bringing FICON and FICON CUP support to the 12000.

In 2003, the 12000 was named “Storage Product of the Year” by Computing, a European IT Publication. Before the SilkWorm 12000, McDATA, which would later be acquired by Brocade in early 2007, held over 90% market share in directors.

As of October 2005, Brocade had sold over 5.5 million ports and held nearly 50% of the overall market, over 60% of the switch market, and, with over 8000 directors sold, nearly 30% of the director market (Dell'Oro, October 2005).

Since its beginning in 1995, Brocade has authored more Fibre Channel standards than any other company and it continues its technical leadership today. (As of Oct 2005) Brocade employees hold leadership positions in some of the industry’s biggest standards groups, including the T11 Technical Committees (INCITS), the Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA), and the Data Management Task Force (DMTF).

[edit] History of Brocade Switches

1st Generation Products - 1997 to 1999

  • ASIC: Stitch
    • Ports: 2
  • Key Products: SilkWorm 1000

2nd Generation Products - 1999 to 2001

  • ASIC: LOOM
    • Speed: 1 Gbit/sec
    • Ports: 4
  • Key Products: SilkWorm 2800, SilkWorm 6400

3rd Generation Products - 2001 to 2004

  • ASIC: BLOOM and BLOOM II
    • Speed: 2 Gbits/sec
    • Ports: 8
  • Key Products: SilkWorm 3800, SilkWorm 12000, SilkWorm 24000

4th Generation Products - 2004 to 2007

  • ASIC: Condor
    • Speed: 4 Gbits/sec
    • Ports: 32
  • Key Products: SilkWorm 1000

[edit] Brocade Products

[edit] Brocade Hardware

Brocade’s major hardware products include award-winning fibre channel switches and directors. Other hardware solutions from Brocade support common protocols that include iSCSI, FCIP, GigE and FICON.

  • SAN Switches (1, 2, and 4 Gbits/sec)
    • Brocade 5000 – Flexible switch with up to 32 ports
    • Brocade 4900 – High-density with up to 64 ports
    • Brocade 4100 – Up to 32 ports
    • Brocade 200E – Entry-level switch with up to 16 ports
    • Brocade M4700 – Entry-level switch with up to 16 ports
    • Brocade M4400 – Up to 16 ports
  • SAN Directors (1, 2, and 4 Gbits/sec)
    • Brocade 48000 – up to 384 ports
    • Brocade Mi10K – up to 256 ports
    • Brocade M6140 – up to 140 ports

[edit] Brocade Software

Brocade’s product portfolio also includes a suite of network and file management applications. Protocols Supported by Brocade Software includes SMB/CIFS and NFS

  • SAN Management Software
    • EFCM
    • Fabric Manager
    • Web Tools
  • SAN Application Modules
    • Application Resource Manager (ARM)
    • Data Migration Manager (DMM)

[edit] Awards and Recognition

  • 2006
    • Brocade SAN Director Wins Gold for Storage Product of the Year
    • Big Bytes SAN Award for Brocade 4900
    • InfoStor MVP Award for the Brocade 48000
    • InfoWorld Technology of the Year Award: Mi10K
  • 2005
    • Search Storage Gold Award: Mi10K
    • Well-Connected Award: SANavigator
    • StorageX Wins Network Magazine Innovation Award
    • StorageX Earns "Excellent" Rating from Redmond Most Valuable Product Evaluation
    • Brocade Router Wins Best FC Product of the Year
  • 2004
    • Brocade MultiProtocol Router wins Product of the Year Award at Paris Data Storage Forum
  • 2003
    • Innovative Technology of the Year from ComputerWorld
    • Brocade 12000 Director wins Product of the Year Award at Paris Data Storage Forum
    • Brocade 3900 Chosen as Finalist in Datamation Product of the Year (Storage Category)
    • Brocade 3800 Finalist in Network Computing "Well Connected" Awards
  • 2002
    • Brocade Wins Product of the Year from Storage Magazine and Searchstorage.com

[edit] Mergers and Acquisitions

  • 2007 – McDATA. Key competitor in the Fibre Channel switch and director market.
  • 2007 – Silverback Systems, Inc. Provides network acceleration technologies.
  • 2006 – NuView, Inc. Develops software solutions for enterprise file data management.
  • 2005 – Therion Software Corporation
  • 2003 – Rhapsody Networks

[edit] See also

[edit] External Link

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