NetApp, formerly known as Network Device Inc., is a computer technology company specializing in data storage equipment and management software. Enterprises and service providers use NetApp storage equipment to store and share vast quantities of digital information across the physiological and hybrid public clouds.
NetApp’s storage hardware includes flash-only and hybrid storage processes for block, file, and object storage. NetApp memory systems integrate with leading public cloud providers and offer native VMware vSphere support for virtualized workloads.
NetApp, a publicly-traded company, commemorating its 25th birthday in 2017, recently ranked 468th on the Wealth 500. It was incorporated for the first time in April 1992 throughout Santa Clara, California. NetApp was added back in Deandwell as relocated to a 58-acre school grounds in Sunnyvale, California, in 2001.
IDC consistently rated NetApp third throughout external memory revenue through Nov 2017, up 6 percent year-over-year to nearly $700 billion. This positioned it before IBM but behind market leader Hp Company (HPE) and No. 2 Dell Inc.
NetApp company background
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In 1992, Dave Hitz, James Lau, and Michael Malcolm founded Network Appliance. The three worked together at the Auspex Systems, a slightly earlier competitor to Network Appliance.
The first Network Appliance commodity was a file server appliance, now known as NetApp filers, designed to eliminate the overhead typically associated with competing products. In 1994, Network Appliance introduced the product to the market with the assistance of almost $13 million in investment capital led by Capital Partners. The product’s design anticipated the concept of fragmentation: a storage high pass filter was connected to, but independent from, an example of such application compute server.
NetApp initially marketed its taxpayers to Unix-based technical working groups that developed client-server software programs for Network File System (NFS). This technology-aided NetApp’s beginnings as innovative internet storage (NAS) company.
Malcolm was the first chairman and Ceo of NetApp but was compelled in 1994 by shareholders making preparations to go public. In November 1995, Daniel Warmenhoven succeeded Malcolm & led Fileserver to its initial offering (IPO). Hitz wrote in his antiquity of NetApp, “How to Decapitate a Bull: Unexpected Learnings in Risk, Growth, and Business Success,” that the stock sale raised at least $26 million “just in the matter of time” because the company had run out of cash.
In 2002, NetApp began selling block-storage SANs with FC and Ethernet-based iSCSI connectivity. NetApp’s entry into SANs intensified competition with rival EMC, trailing NetApp throughout NAS market share but leading the SAN market. The largest pure-play memory companies were EMC and NetApp, while IBM & Hewlett-Packard sold servers and storage.
In 2009, Warmenhoven passed the CEO responsibilities to Tom Georgens. Warmenhoven continued to serve as chairman of NetApp until 2014. Before becoming CEO, Georgens served as NetApp’s chief operating officer. During Georgens’ time in office, NetApp earnings reached a peak of $6,3 billion in 2014; the company lagged behind other heritage storage vendors in releasing all-flash, cloud, and hyper-converged product systems.
In 2015, NetApp fired Georgens due to a string of disheartening quarters characterized by flat income and slow customer improvements from OnTap-7 Configuration to grouped OnTap. After holding several executive positions at NetApp, including most recent times executive vice president of product innovation, George Kurian assumed the CEO role.
After Dell acquired EMC for further than $60 billion in 2016, NetApp became the largest storage-focused company. NetApp reported quarterly earnings of $1.52 billion in February 2018. Two thousand fifteen acquisitions of SolidFire all-flash clusters were included in the results. In 2017, cloud and flash accounted for approximately 70% of product revenue.
Justice Department investigation into trade sanctions
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The Post Reported in 2011 that NetApp had been accused of violating U.S. punitive tariffs besides selling hard disks to the Syrian government, which was designated as a terrorist state. Reportedly, NetApp hardware was discovered in a surveillance system designed to intercept the email or other communication services of rebels critical of the government of Syrian Bashar Al.
NetApp was among the companies implicated in the investigation, which included HPE. NetApp’s Italian conglomerate reportedly sold the storage equipment to an authorized vendor, who offered for sale it to Neighborhood SpA, a Milan, Italy, startup system for monitoring and intercepting digital data communications.
After a lengthy investigation, the U.S. Department of Justice deduced in 2014 that NetApp had committed no wrongdoing.
Principal products, features, and applications
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Fabric-Attached Storage (FAS) arrays, available in all-flash and hybrid configurations, constitute the vendor’s flagship product line. Multiprotocol FAS clusters support FC, FC over Ethernet, and iSCSI for block storage, and CIFS, NFS, and SMB for file storage.
The NetApp OnTap able to operate the system is utilized by FAS arrays. NetApp FAS offers sharable NAS and SAN storage and serves as a data repository for NetApp FlexPod and Nflex Converged Connectivity products.
NetApp FlexPod integrates FAS storage to Cisco Unified Computer Systems and Cisco Collaboration fabric switches. Netflix Netflix’s All-Flash FAS (AFF) and hybrid arrays to Fujitsu Primergy CX400 M4 x86 scalable server are required, and Extreme Networks network switches.#
