Brocade And McAfee Enable Channel Partners To Deliver Integrated And Simplified Network-based Security Solutions

SAN JOSE & SANTA CLARA(BUSINESS WIRE) Brocade and McAfee, Inc. today announced that they have completed the next phase of a strategic partnership created to deliver a broad set of fully interoperable, simplified network-based security solutions through joint channel partners. McAfee and Brocade have developed a series of jointly designed, end-to-end network security solutions with advanced functionality, including fully automated threat response and enforcement, firewall load balancing and a broad set of intrusion prevention capabilities.

To help fully equip partners with the necessary tools to profitably sell these joint solutions, Brocade and McAfee have rolled out comprehensive channel marketing and sales enablement programs. These programs feature detailed use cases and multifaceted awareness campaigns to help partners identify customer challenges and design network security solutions for enterprise IT environments.

"As a major technology provider for the federal market, we clearly recognize that IT security is paramount to the solution providers and government end users we serve," said Skip Liesegang, vice president of the Government Channels Division at immixGroup, Inc. "The work that Brocade and McAfee have done regarding the roll-out of these solutions to the channel exemplifies the high level of foresight and dedication from both companies to bring comprehensive network security solutions for a wide range of networking environments that enable federal agencies to reduce IT complexity and operational costs."

To deliver greater customer value, Brocade and McAfee have focused on optimizing network management integration functions between their leading-edge product sets to enhance the scalability and resiliency of threat protection, defend against intrusion attacks and bolster firewall capabilities. These solutions enable customers to:
    * Simplify management of network and security appliances by enabling IT staff to remotely control network and security devices. With Brocade IronView?? Network Manager (INM), administrators can discover and monitor network health and the topology of McAfee security devices via a single user interface.
    * Invoke automated network responses to security events by enabling the network infrastructure to take policy-based actions - as close to the source of attack or point of violation as possible - to thoroughly isolate the issue and prevent network impact. Using open standards-based network management protocols, Brocade INM automatically responds to security events generated by McAfee network access control, intrusion prevention and firewall solutions.
    * Maximize firewall performance, availability and scalability by utilizing advanced server load balancing capabilities to help ensure high levels of network availability with Brocade ServerIron?? ADX Series Layer 4-7 switches operating with McAfee firewalls. This solution also enables administrators to remove or add firewalls without interruption of service or cumbersome network reconfiguration, resulting in simplified network management and increased uptime.
    * Maintain secure, highly available networks by using McAfee intrusion prevention systems (IPS) to inspect Brocade network traffic and validate its content to help prevent malicious activities. McAfee IPS seamlessly interoperates with Brocade networking technologies to support all Ethernet interface configurations.

"The pairing of Brocade's industry-leading networking technologies with the comprehensive portfolio of McAfee security products presents customers with unprecedented levels of end-to-end threat protection," said Alex Thurber, senior vice president of Worldwide Channels and Commercial Sales at McAfee. "Pulling from the strengths of both companies, this strategic partnership has resulted in new joint solutions that leverage network intelligence to provide simplified monitoring and management of IT security in a way that has never been done before."The continued proliferation of feature-rich applications, coupled with the increase in the number of personal computers and mobile devices, is placing an unprecedented amount of pressure on IT organizations to protect their mission-critical enterprise information assets. In addition, as organizations begin the transition towards highly virtualized infrastructures to support cloud-enabled environments, the network is becoming the aggregation point where information is stored and managed.

As a result of this shift, organizations need to protect and secure their networks with validated solutions that reduce IT complexity, are scalable and enable deeper management functionality. The pairing of Brocade leading-edge networking products with the extensive security capabilities of McAfee provides customers with a simplified, pretested way to protect their network infrastructure and helps provide channel partners with a way to deliver comprehensive, scalable network security solutions that address customer needs.

"Brocade and McAfee are not only committed to developing best-in-class network security solutions, but we are also steadfast in jointly defining the channel routes-to-market for these solutions," said Barbara Spicek, vice president of Worldwide Channels at Brocade. "Through this partnership, Brocade and McAfee are united through a common vision to provide opportunities for the channel to increase profitability via the delivery of simplified, open standards-based network security solutions."

The solutions are being delivered under a multiyear partnership between Brocade and McAfee through select value-added resellers. To learn more about Brocade and McAfee joint technology solutions, visit www.brocade.com/mcafee. For more information on Brocade enterprise network security solutions, visit www.brocade.com/networksecurity.