SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., Sept. 8, 2008 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Fibre Channel Industry Association (FCIA), a non-profit international organization of manufacturers, systems integrators and vendors today announced its newly elected Board of Directors, strategic roadmap and direction for 2008/2009. Today, Fibre Channel technology continues to be the data center standard for storage area networks and enterprise storage, with more than 80 percent market share. The FCIA organization consists of over 80 companies globally, all of which are leaders in the Fibre Channel industry and continue to provide thought leadership, education and guidance to the growing storage networking market.
The newly elected members of the 2008/2009 FCIA Board of Directors are as follows:
FCIA Officers:
* Chairman: Skip Jones - QLogic * Vice Chairman: Tom Hammond-Doel - LSI * Treasurer: Jeff Eckard - NetApp * Secretary: Chris Hoffman - Emulex
Members at Large:
* Martin Czekalski - Seagate * Anthony Faustini - Cisco Systems * Sean Fitzpatrick - Hewlett-Packard * Steven Wilson - Brocade Communications * Yuichi Arai - Netmarks Inc.; FCIA Japan BOD Liaison member
"The FCIA continues to work with leading organizations that consistently bring innovative Fibre Channel solutions to the market," said Skip Jones, Chairman FCIA. "The collective expertise of the new board members will enable the FCIA to further educate, develop and evangelize the benefits of the Fibre Channel technology."
Fibre Channel Recent Developments
The FCIA strongly supports development around 16Gb/s (16GFC) technology, doubling the performance of today's 8Gb/s (8GFC) Fibre Channel products while maintaining full backward compatibility.
The FCIA in addition supports the upcoming FCoE (Fibre Channel over Ethernet) standard and the expected products depending on it. In recent FCoE developments, member companies are in product development and gearing up to deliver this solution over the coming months. FCoE enables SAN traffic to be natively transported over Ethernet networks, while protecting and extending the investment that customers have made in Fibre Channel storage networks.
As FCoE continues to gain mindshare, the FCIA is planning the first FCoE compliance plugfest the week of September 15th at the University of New Hampshire - Interoperability Lab. The FCIA also plans to showcase and demonstrate leading Fibre Channel advancements at Storage Networking World in Dallas, Texas the week of October 13, 2008. For additional SNW information, please go to www.snwusa.com.
About FCIA
The Fibre Channel Industry Association (FCIA) is a non-profit international organization whose sole purpose is to act as the independent technology and marketing voice of the Fibre Channel industry. We are committed to helping member organizations promote and position Fibre Channel, and to providing a focal point for Fibre Channel information, standards advocacy, and education.
FCIA members include manufacturers, system integrators, developers, vendors, industry professionals, and end users. Our member-led working groups and committees focus on creating and championing the Fibre Channel technology roadmaps, targeting applications that include data storage, video, networking, and storage area network (SAN) management. For more info, go to http://www.fibrechannel.org