BlueArc Reveals Customers

BlueArc Corp. announced today that Altera Corp., Extreme Networks Inc. (Nasdaq: EXTR), and Juniper Networks Inc. (Nasdaq: JNPR) each purchased the startup's Si7500 Storage System last quarter. The Si7500 links Fibre Channel storage arrays to servers over gig Ethernet networks (see BlueArc Shipping Storage Systems and Top Ten Private Storage Networking Companies, page 3).

BlueArc says the three newly announced customers aren't the only takers for its box, which it claims performs two to 10 times better than existing products, such as servers from EMC Corp. (NYSE: EMC) and

Network Appliance Inc. (Nasdaq: NTAP). But in making the announcement, BlueArc clearly hoped to make a statement.

"I'm sure it's no accident that the first three customers BlueArc has named are organizations with cachet, performance-oriented firms," says Robert Gray, research director of storage systems at IDC.

Gray says that, while having customers doesn't prove BlueArc's products work, "The raw speed has been proven." The announcement does address the challenge to BlueArc of marketing its wares effectively in a tight market. "It's a cool marketing move," Gray says.

So far, however, the three customers announced today aren't willing to go so far as to say they've replaced any gear with BlueArc's equipment. Instead, they insist they're complementing what's already there -- in the case of Juniper and Extreme, that means NAS gear from Network Appliance. Altera has been using direct-attached RAID arrays from unspecified suppliers.All three customers are using the new equipment for fairly mundane applications. In Extreme's case, the Si7500 is being used to speed up demonstrations of gigabit Ethernet switching gear in the company's executive briefing center. Juniper, which makes high-speed routers, is using it as a file server for its engineering development team. And Altera, a manufacturer of programmable silicon, is using the server for backup at its corporate headquarters.

Altera also has a pre-existing relationship with BlueArc, because it supplies part of the silicon on which the Si7500 is based.

While none of the companies would say how much they'd spent on the new gear, BlueArc's director of product marketing, Bart Bartlett, says the deals fall within the range of the startup's average selling price of $200,000 per customer.

Today's announcement may help BlueArc prove it's on the map at last. But sources say the battle is far from won. IDC's Gray, for instance, says BlueArc is challenged to prove it can deliver not only speed and throughput but also breadth of enterprise-related functionality, including things like data copy and backup.

BlueArc says it's on the case already. To quote Bartlett, the Si7500 has been integrated with backup software and an enterprise tape backup from "all of the major providers." Within the next couple of weeks, he says, BlueArc plans to officially announce full integration of its NAS gear with specific partners' wares.-- Mary Jander, Senior Editor, Light Reading
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