Original URL: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/12/17/netapp_kills_datafort/
NetApp to take DataFort out back and give it mercy bullet
The future is wrapped in Brocade
Posted in Storage, 17th December 2010 12:27 GMT
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NetApp is end-of-life-ing its DataFort security appliance product line, with a planned migration path to Brocade products.
Word has come to El Reg that some DataFort customers are receiving end-of-life statements with February 2011 as the termination month. NetApp CTO Jay Kidd said back in September 2008 that: "NetApp will resell the Brocade products as our next generation FC (Fibre Channel) DataFort," and that there would be an E-Series for Ethernet and an S-Series for SCSI.
So now it looks as if time is up for NetApp direct DataFort customers, but there is a migration path. A NetApp statement said:
The Fibre Channel version of DataFort went EoA in September 2010 as a result of NetApp’s close relationship with Brocade, resulting in a next-generation solution that protects our customers’ investment in the above-mentioned NetApp DataFort appliances and offers a seamless migration path.The Brocade Encryption Switch (BES) offers better scalability, better performance and heterogeneity and can be introduced into any FC SAN fabric (Brocade or Cisco) just like a NetApp DataFort Appliance. NetApp has a comprehensive encryption and security strategy and as this evolves we provide appropriate advanced warning to our customers of the upcoming End of Availability of products.
Brocade [1] has licensed the Decru technology, acquired when NetApp bought Decru for $272m in June 2005.
NetApp is getting out of the business of building its own security bump-in-the-wire product, and concentrating on building shared storage products at the end of the wire. ®