Media Contacts:
Dr. Henry Schaffer, 919 515-4466 Information Technology Division
Jude Davis, 919 515-1075

July 6, 2007

Sun awards VCL an Academic Excellence Grant

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NC State’s Virtual Computing Lab (VCL) has an important new partner.  In June 2007, Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ: SUNW) awarded North Carolina State University an Academic Excellence Grant to incorporate the Sun Blade platform into the VCL environment. The equipment donation is valued at $82,370.00.

Sun’s Academic Excellence Grants provide equipment to education and research organizations in order to advance creative projects and promote partnerships.

NC State’s AEG will be used to include Sun Blade Servers in the heavily used VCL environment.

“We are extremely pleased to add Sun Microsystems to the list of corporate partners who are greatly helping us in this meaningful project,” says Dr. Henry Schaffer, Professor Emeritus of Genetics & Biomathematics and Coordinator of Special IT Projects & Faculty Collaboration for the Information Technology Division.

The VCL is now available to over 30,000 end-users in the NC State community, and it is being used on a pilot basis by other campuses in the UNC System. The NC Community College System has requested state government funding to use VCL technology to support their needs.  NC State’s Friday Institute for Educational Innovation is collaborating in the project with the goal of serving K-12 across the state.

“Every additional step which increases educational and research opportunities is exciting – and the AEG adds to this excitement in two ways,” says Dr. Schaffer.  “It provides an additional technological approach to explore to better meet the needs of our students and researchers. And it also enhances the computing infrastructure and thereby increases the total quantity of services available.”

Sun made news at the recent International Supercomputing Conference in Dresden, Germany by demonstrating its new High Performance Computing (HPC) solutions. The Sun Constellation System is the result of their collaboration with the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC).