Pillar Addresses Plaxo's Mission Critical Storage Needs

Pillar Axiom™ to Support Plaxo's Fast Growing Database of Over Five Million Subscribers

San Jose, CA (October 19, 2005) – Pillar Data Systems, a leading provider of enterprise network storage systems, today announced that Plaxo®, Inc. has chosen its Pillar Axiom storage system as the foundation for Plaxo's online-transaction-processing (OLTP) database, a key element of its booming online information management business. Plaxo's initial purchase included four Pillar Axiom systems totaling nearly 100 terabytes of storage.

Plaxo serves millions of users who keep their personal information continually updated through its combination of free and subscription online products. "Our back-end database is mission critical to the success of Plaxo's operation. It supports the crux of what we do," explained Ethan Erchinger, Plaxo's operations manager. "We needed a solution that was secure, powerful yet affordable, from a company that would be there for the long term, and could scale elegantly with the rapid growth of our business. Pillar more than met our expectations."

On average, Plaxo's system handles about 10,000 I/Os per second. Those numbers are rapidly increasing as Plaxo extends its service to various platforms and email clients. Plaxo is used by millions of individuals in over 83 countries, and enjoys a wide following in academia, government, and both small and large businesses, including 98 of the Fortune 100 companies.

"Needless to say, scalability is a major issue for them," said Adrian Jones, senior vice president of Sales for Pillar Data Systems. "Managing many terabytes of mission critical data, Plaxo made it clear that performance and reliability were their top criterion. So we had Plaxo verify our SAN capabilities and performance by literally bringing its servers into Pillar, configuring them as they would be at Plaxo, and giving the Pillar system a real-world test drive."

According to Erchinger, another advantage that influenced Plaxo's purchase decision is Pillar's Quality of Service (QoS) and multi-tenancy capabilities. "I was impressed by the levels of QoS that Pillar supports. We always keep a hot and live backup, and on Pillar, we do it with the same hardware, but assign the backup to a lower QoS. For us, that's a big savings in additional investment."

He continued, "I think Pillar's ability, in its class, is unmatched. After starting out with direct-attached storage, and dealing with scaling, provisioning and data management obstacles, Pillar's Axiom really shines. We were also comfortable Pillar would be there for us, over time, with the right products, at the right time."

About Pillar Data Systems
Founded in 2001, Pillar Data Systems develops midrange and enterprise network storage systems. The company's Pillar Axiom solution, driven by its innovative policy-based management capabilities, integrates SAN and NAS into a centrally managed storage platform. Pillar Axiom systems consolidate multiple tiers of enterprise network storage into a single, easily managed system capable of scaling to hundreds of terabytes of capacity. Pillar Data Systems is privately funded by Tako Ventures, LLC, the venture arm of Larry Ellison. The company is headquartered at 2840 Junction Avenue, San Jose, California 95134. The company can be reached on the Web at http://www.pillardata.com, by phone at 408-503-4000 or by email at sales@pillardata.com.

Press contact:

Chip Woerner
Pillar Data Systems
408.503.4040
cwoerner@pillardata.com

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