Network Engines (NEI)

[blueskywaves]

storage is a hot topic with the big brokerage firms going forward

Yes, new regulations like the ones below have a lot to do with this, but the storage sector has come a long way too. Storage has consistently been one of the best-performing technology sectors ever since EMC decisively broke the sacrosanct 1:1 linkage between the mainframe and storage in 1990 with the original Symmetrix.

NENG builds the storage nodes for EMC's Centera.

EMC Centera Compliance Edition™ Raises Bar for Regulatory Compliance

Meets SEC's New Interpretive Release for Rule 17a-4 for Electronic Records Retention; Becomes First Storage System Compliant with U.S. Department of Defense 5015.2 for Content Shredding; Designated by Deloitte Consulting as "21 CFR Part11 Ready" for Life Sciences Organizations

New York (SIA Technology Management Conference)- Tuesday, June 17, 2003

Setting the pace for regulated electronic records storage solutions, EMC Corporation today announced that Centera Compliance Edition™ content addressed storage (CAS) has achieved major compliance milestones in three of the most strictly regulated industries: financial services, federal government, and life sciences.

Financial Services: SEC Rule 17a-4

EMC announced that Centera Compliance Edition (CE) meets the standards set forth by the recent SEC Interpretive Release on Rule 17a-4. The SEC Interpretive Release clarified the Commission's views on the standards for broker-dealer firms preserving electronic records and email on disk-based storage media. Specifically, the Interpretive Release affirms that broker-dealers can meet the non-rewriteable and non-erasable requirements of Rule 17a-4 through the employment of a storage solution that uses integrated hardware and software codes to prevent the overwriting, erasure or alteration of the records. The SEC Interpretive Release also states that storage solutions that only mitigate the risk a record will be overwritten or erased do not meet the requirements of Rule 17a-4. "Such systems—which may use software applications to protect electronic records, such as authentication and approval policies, passwords or other extrinsic security controls - do not maintain the records in a manner that is non-rewriteable and non-erasable." For the full SEC Interpretive Release: http://www.sec.gov/rules/interp/34-47806.htm

Peter Gerr, Senior Analyst at Enterprise Storage Group, said, "EMC Centera Compliance Edition content addressed storage is driving the innovation wave in the regulated electronic records storage space and is currently the only disk-based storage solution that clearly meets all components of the new SEC Interpretive Release on Rule 17a-4."

Federal Government: DoD 5015.2

EMC announced that Centera CE has become the first-ever storage solution certified by the U.S. Department of Defense. CE's content shredding capability has proven to meet federal standards for the destruction of records. Content shredding ensures that records, once deleted, cannot be recovered. Although the DoD 5015.2 standard for shredding only governs Department of Defense components, it is a widely accepted benchmark outside of the federal space for organizations that need to minimize exposure to litigation by fully destroying expired records or meet privacy and security HIPAA regulations.

Life Sciences: FDA 21 CFR Part 11

EMC today announced that Deloitte Consulting, a premiere authority on life sciences regulatory compliance, has designated Centera CE as "Part 11 Compliance Ready" following an extensive audit and risk analysis of the solution.

Food and Drug Administration (FDA), 21 CFR Part 11 establishes requirements "to ensure that electronic records and electronic signatures are trustworthy, reliable and generally equivalent substitutes for paper records and traditionally handwritten signatures." This systematic approach to compliance mandates that drug development and clinical trial data must be archived in an unalterable form for the life of a drug or longer.

Dr. Michael Breggar, Global Director of Deloitte Consulting's Regulatory Practice, stated, "We believe that the Centera CE solution offers many advantages over certain existing magnetic and optical storage media solutions for purposes of compliant fixed content data management. Perhaps the most exciting feature of the Centera CE solution from a reliability standpoint is its self-healing functionality, which greatly enhances failure prevention."

For the full whitepaper on Deloitte's analysis:
http://www.emc.com/vertical/life_sciences.jsp?rfg=/forms/deloitte/index.jsp

In the international regulatory landscape, EMC Centera Compliance Edition is a certified solution under the trade and tax laws for Germany, Austria and Switzerland. These regulations, along with Germany's GoB and GoBS rules for proper accounting, set standards and methods for electronic bookkeeping.

About EMC Centera

The world's first CAS solution, EMC Centera is EMC's fastest growing product line. and the world's leading online archival storage medium. Resolving the challenges that had traditionally prevented institutions from bringing their fixed content online, Centera's revolutionary content addressing technology drastically reduces management overhead, enabling one full time employee to manage up to 350 terabytes of fixed content. Centera's unique self-healing and authentication features have prompted its industry-wide recognition as the first disk-based WORM (write once, read many) storage medium.

About EMC Centera Compliance Edition

With Centera Compliance Edition, Compliance Officers and IT administrators can leverage all the benefits of a base Centera CAS solution, while enjoying compliance-focused features such as retention enforcement, which enables compliance officers to set hardened retention periods on electronic records; enhanced disposition, or "shredding," which ensures that deleted data cannot be recovered using disk scanning tools; and application access security, which permits Systems Operators to establish access security and authorized activities by defined "communities" at the application or server level, and ensures the privacy of sensitive records.

About Deloitte Consulting

Deloitte Consulting is one of the world's leading management consulting firms, and is uniquely known for its straightforward approach to solving today's most complex business challenges. Deloitte Consulting works hand-in-hand with clients to improve business performance, drive shareholder value, and create competitive advantage. The firm has 20,000 professionals in 31 markets, and serves more than one-third of the companies in the Global Fortune® 500. It is the only consulting firm with five straight appearances on Fortune Magazine's list of "100 Best Companies to Work for in America." Deloitte Consulting can be found on the Internet at http://www.dc.com.

About EMC

EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) is the world leader in information storage systems, software, networks and services, providing automated networked storage solutions for organizations across the globe. Information about EMC's products and services can be found at www.EMC.com.

http://www.emc.com/news/press_releases/viewUS.jsp?id=1661