PALO ALTO, CA -- HP (NYSE:HPQ) today introduced a broad range of products and solutions for Oracle9i Real Application Clusters, further strengthening its position as a leading supplier of Oracle database solutions. Today's announcement includes new offerings as well as updates to HP's current portfolio of products ranging from industry-standard to enterprise UNIX® servers that support Oracle9i Real Application Clusters, including new pre-configured, ready-to-run Oracle9i Real Application Clusters configurations and an Oracle and HP blueprint for enterprise server consolidation. "With Oracle9i Real Application Clusters, Oracle has the best database clustering technology around," said Doug Kennedy, vice president, Platform Alliances, Platform Technologies Division, Oracle Corp. "By combining that with HP's broad range of UNIX, Windows and Linux servers, Oracle and HP are able to deliver the highest levels of availability, scalability, and system and cluster management. Our customers can achieve the best possible levels of performance and availability and have OS flexibility." "Oracle database technology on HP systems meets the most demanding customer needs for designing, deploying and managing clustered databases," said Mark Hudson, worldwide marketing manager, HP Business Critical Systems. "We believe that our technology and broad market acceptance combined with the leadership position of Oracle's 9i Real Application Clusters will further accelerate the market adoption of clustered databases." UNIX Offerings HP announced that pre-built, ready-to-run AlphaServer ES45 clustered systems running Tru64 UNIX are now available with the latest database clustering software, Oracle9i Database Release 2.2. These configurations, which are flexible in their memory size, node number and storage capacity, are configured for high availability. The pre-installed configurations enable customers to have faster time-to-deployment and simplified expandability. The configurations are available from HP and select partners for delivery within nine days from order. These configurations have been tested by HP and Oracle and have received Oracle certification. The clustered systems also can be extended and deployed as disaster-tolerant solutions. "HP delivers TruCluster-based technology scaled in proportion to our needs, providing us with world-class enterprise database functionality and availability on a small-server budget," said Mike Bathalon, IT operations manager, Green Mountain Power. The second largest electric utility in Vermont, Green Mountain Power recently consolidated numerous database applications to Oracle9i Real Application Clusters on a TruCluster 2-node AlphaServer ES45 system. HP also announced that the first pre-configured, ready-to-run clustered AlphaServer ES45 systems running OpenVMS with Oracle9i Real Application Clusters are now available, providing customers with risk reduction and time-to-market benefits similar to the Tru64 UNIX family of offerings. Flexible Financing, Consolidation Blueprint HP's Business Alignment Financing for AlphaServer systems, including a cluster node on-demand capability, gives customers in the United States, Canada and Europe the flexibility to customize their IT payment structure to correspond with their revenue or anticipated variations in computer use. "Customers have told us they are looking for flexibility. They want to use an IT solution when they need it and pay for it accordingly," said Irv Rothman, president and chief executive officer, HP Financial Services. "The new Business Alignment Financing program allows AlphaServer customers to meet their need of aligning payments with usage." In addition, the online document, "The Oracle E-mail Blueprint for HP with Oracle9i Real Application Clusters," is available to help customers implement a consolidation initiative to achieve enhanced scalability, availability and manageability. The blueprint is based on best practices established by HP and Oracle in the consolidation of Oracle's worldwide email infrastructure to a clustered three-node HP server running HP-UX with Oracle9i Real Application Clusters that was announced in February 2001. The blueprint is available at http://www.oracle.com/ip/std_infrastructure/blueprints/emailonhp/ index.html?content.html. (Due to the length of this URL, it may be necessary to copy and paste this hyperlink into your Internet browser's URL address field.) "We chose Oracle9i Real Application Clusters on an HP cluster for both availability and cost effectiveness," said Peter Gjoerup, chief information officer, Top-Toy. "We wanted to reduce both planned and unplanned downtime to a minimum because the availability of our applications are critical 24 by 7. With Oracle9i Real Application Clusters and HP Serviceguard we can actually lose a server and still be up and running. The most cost-effective way for us to archive this was with Oracle9i Real Application Clusters because it allowed us to utilize all the resources of the cluster all the time." Top-Toy controls the purchase and distribution of toys from around the world and resells these toys throughout shops in Scandinavia. Through this implementation, Top-Toy now can operate its distribution center more efficiently and provide better customer service to the more than 250 retail shops that rely on Top-Toy as a central hub. As part of its ongoing plan to continue enhancing the functionality of HP-UX, HP plans to bring key features from Tru64 UNIX, including TruCluster Server and Advanced File System capabilities into future releases of HP-UX 11i in the 2004 timeframe. Select components of TruCluster Server software, the technology leader in clustering, also have been licensed by Oracle (http://www.oracle.com) for integration into Oracle9i Real Application Clusters. Windows, Linux Offerings HP, which was the first vendor to deliver an Oracle9i Real Application Clusters certified configuration on Intel architecture servers, continues to offer the broadest range of Oracle solutions on industry-standard HP ProLiant servers running both Microsoft® Windows® 2000 and Linux. "Our HP ProLiant server cluster provides an outstanding platform for the implementation of our Oracle9i Real Application Clusters with the Linux operating system," said Daniel Murguia, operations and information systems manager, AFP Futuro Bolivia. "The ProLiant servers give us the availability we require and enable us to scale-out as our needs grow -- all in a very cost-effective manner." HP ProLiant clusters for Oracle9i Real Application Clusters are available from two to four nodes on multiple ProLiant servers running Windows 2000 and Linux. These clusters integrate industry-standard, fault-resilient ProLiant servers with HP StorageWorks SANs in pre-tested configurations with Oracle9i Real Application Clusters delivering a highly available, scalable and cost-effective solution. Additional information on HP clustering solutions is available at http://www.hp.com/products/clusters.