FREMONT, Calif., Dec. 8 -- Panasas, Inc., the leading provider of high-performance storage for the world's most performance-intensive applications, and Arista Networks, the leader in non-blocking 10-Gigabit Ethernet switches, today announced that they are working together to optimize non-blocking 10-Gigabit Ethernet as the network of choice for high-performance storage systems. The two companies agreed to test and optimize their currently-shipping systems to ensure that customers receive maximum performance and reliability when their systems are installed together. In addition, Panasas and Arista have agreed to enhance future systems to take best advantage of high-performance Ethernet-based storage.

The joint effort was inspired by Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), which is a customer of both companies. LANL runs one of the world's fastest supercomputers, called Roadrunner. This system, built on an Ethernet-switched backbone network capable of more than 250 gigabits per second, connects a single Panasas storage system at more than 55 gigabits per second in production workloads.

"At LANL, high-performance 10-Gigabit Ethernet access to storage is a critical component of our supercomputer," said Gary Grider, deputy division leader at Los Alamos National Laboratory. "Panasas and massively parallel applications of Ethernet for storage area networks have played an important role at LANL. We expect these technologies to become even more important in the next generation of our systems, which are targeting a 3x increase in performance and a 100x increase in future applications."

"Traditional 10-Gigabit Ethernet switches are optimized for oversubscribed routine backbone data delivery," said Mansour Karam, director of business development at Arista. "Arista sees high-performance storage as a key application for non-blocking, high-performance Ethernet network designs and is working with the leader in that arena, Panasas, to optimize 10-Gigabit Ethernet for technical environments."

"In the past Panasas has had to work around the limitations of conventional oversubscribed Ethernet switches and network designs to deliver the performance customers like LANL expect," said Garth Gibson, chief technical officer at Panasas. "Working with Arista allows us to leverage that experience into the design and deployment of new non-blocking network interconnect fabrics enabled by the powerful new architecture of the industry's most innovative 10-Gigabit Ethernet switches."

About Arista Networks

Arista Networks was founded to deliver cloud networking solutions for large datacenter and computing environments. Arista offers best-of-breed 10-Gigabit Ethernet switches that redefine scalability, robustness, and price-performance. At the core of Arista's platform is the Extensible Operating System (EOS), a pioneering new software architecture with self-healing and live in-service software upgrade capabilities. Arista's team is composed of experienced management and engineering talent from leading networking companies. Arista markets its products worldwide through distribution partners, systems integrators, and resellers with a strong dedication to partner and customer success. For more information, visit www.aristanetworks.com or contact Arista at media@aristanetworks.com or 650-462-5000.

About Panasas

Panasas, Inc., the leading provider of high-performance storage for the world's most performance-intensive applications, helps commercial, government and academic organizations accelerate their time to results, leading to real-world breakthroughs that improve people's lives. Panasas high-performance storage systems enable customers to maximize the benefits of compute clusters by eliminating the storage bottleneck created with legacy network storage technologies. Panasas ActiveStor Parallel Storage Clusters, in conjunction with the ActiveScale operating environment and PanFS parallel file system, offer the most comprehensive portfolio of storage solutions for high-performance computing (HPC) environments. Panasas is headquartered in Fremont, Calif. For more information, visit www.panasas.com.

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Source: Panasas, Inc.; Arista Networks, Inc.