History 2002: McData Tries to Switch Off Brocade

McData, the leader in director-class FC switches ahead of Inrange Technologies, has sued Brocade Communication Systems, which as it happens is launching this very type of high end product.

Could there be a connection between the two events?

Brocade stands accused of infringing on a McData patent entitled Method and apparatus for measuring traffic within a switch, which describes operations for filtering and measuring frame traffic within the switch.

The defendant insists, not surprisingly, that these claims are “without merit” and intends to defend itself “vigorously” (is there any other way?), but has not (yet) filed the inevitable countersuit.

For the time being, Brocade has not been prevented (an injunction is pending), at least in the short term, from selling its much-delayed SilkWorm 12000, with up to 128 ports, its current 3800 model nor a new low-cost 2Gb FC 8-port 3200 model soon to arrive and designed to compete with QLogic, yet McData’s lawsuit could cause rival Brocade’s customers some concern.

Brocade 12000 Director

McData holds 25 issued patents related to storage area networking, with an additional 15 pending.

We know of only one for Brocade, involving a Fibre Channel switching system and method.

Meanwhile, as the 2 legal adversaries continue to squabble in the courtroom, Inrange is free to pursue its promotion of a new 256-port FC/9000 director in utter tranquility.

Note: After $350 million IPO in 2000, McData was sold to EMC in 1996 for $230 million.

This article is an abstract of news published on issue 170 on March 2002 from the former paper version of Computer Data Storage Newsletter.