News release

Tyson Foods Chooses Compaq High Availability Solution for Mission-Critical Applications

Compaq Global Services Teams With Avnet Enterprise Solutions to Provide Transparent Technology Transition

Compaq Computer Corporation (NYSE: CPQ) announced today that Tyson Foods, Inc. (NYSE: TSN), the world's largest poultry and meat processing company, has chosen Compaq AlphaServer and StorageWorks to host its mission-critical sales and distribution applications. Tyson expects this architecture investment to help it integrate its various business units while speeding up some of its business processes and positioning itself for future growth.

"We needed an IT architecture that would enable us to quickly and seamlessly port our mission-critical sales and distribution applications while providing the highest availability and data integrity," said Gary Cooper, CIO, Tyson Foods, Inc. "Our desired solution also needed to easily scale as we integrated additional business units. Compaq met our mission-critical needs while providing a painless migration path from our legacy systems."

IT infrastructure architect Avnet Enterprise Solutions, a Compaq business partner, was responsible for the system configuration and initial system setup. The production platform includes a three-node AlphaServer ES40 cluster, with four processors on each node, running OpenVMS. The AlphaServer cluster is attached to an MA8000 StorageWorks scalable SAN, which allows additional disks, controllers, and cache to be added incrementally when required. Tyson does its development work on two other AlphaServer systems—a DS10 and a DS20.

The ES40 cluster together with the MA8000 provides Tyson with some of the highest system availability on the market. Compaq is the world's leader in clustering technology, and the OpenVMS cluster system has the high availability—or even disaster tolerance capabilities—needed for mission-critical applications. The MA8000 system's redundant system-level architecture plus high-availability storage software provides continuous data access, meeting the most stringent availability requirements.

"Compaq has a rich history in providing high availability systems," said Mark Zerbe, president, Avnet Enterprise Solutions. "Avnet Enterprise Solutions' long-standing partnership with Compaq and our focus on Compaq hardware and software solutions means we can offer customers the kind of expertise and value they're looking for."

Proven Value

Once the systems were delivered to Tyson, Compaq Global Services assisted in laying out the database storage area across the SAN disks to ensure the highest levels of performance. Compaq Global Services worked in conjunction with the Tyson team to perform the stress testing and final system configurations to ensure that the system hardware would perform optimally when the system went live.

One of the best testaments to a smooth system migration is when no one notices a migration has taken place. At Tyson, the existing system was turned off on a Friday evening and the following Monday morning, Tyson was running on the new system—business as usual. The new solution has been operational for a month and already Tyson has seen a 66 percent faster turnaround time on reports and a 400 percent improvement in batch run times.

"Our core strength includes leveraging the advantages of industry-standard technologies with the correct balance of custom architecture to meet any one customer's current needs without pointlessly scrapping their legacy systems," said Jerry Earle, regional vice president, Compaq. "Our ability to deliver scalable and easy-to-manage technology solutions with demonstrable value is what distinguishes Compaq from other IT vendors in the market."

About Compaq Enterprise Storage

Compaq, the number one global storage solutions supplier, is the leader in the development and delivery of the enterprise SAN. Recognized for its vision and ability to execute, Compaq is committed to driving radical simplification and investment protection for enterprise and SMB customers. By continuing to extend its Enterprise Network Storage Architecture (ENSA) in key areas such as virtualization, automation, universal network storage and life cycle data management, Compaq enables customers to efficiently manage complex, mixed storage environments. More information on StorageWorks and SANworks solutions is available at www.compaq.com/storage.

Company Background

Founded in 1982, Compaq Computer Corporation is a leading global provider of information technology products, services and solutions for enterprise customers. Compaq designs, develops, manufactures and markets information technology equipment, software, services and solutions, including industry-leading enterprise storage and computing solutions, fault-tolerant business-critical solutions, communication products, personal desktop and notebook computers, and personal entertainment and Internet access devices that are sold in more than 200 countries directly and through a network of authorized Compaq marketing partners. Information on Compaq and its products and services is available at http://www.compaq.com.