Working Together
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Switch interoperability has finally arrived in the Fibre Channel market. After years of reluctance to embrace this practice (a common problem in the storage industry), at least some vendors are giving it a try, as Ethernet and IP have found room to compete in the storage market. McData and Brocade have been among the worst offenders. Brocade owns more than 90 percent of the midrange market, while McData dominates in the high-end director-class switch arena, yet neither has officially supported interoperability between their respective switch brands.
Recently, however, McData got religion. The company has transformed itself into an active force for interoperability--much like QLogic has always been--and is truly trying to make its products work with those of its competitors (those that will cooperate, at least). The company understands that having 90 percent market share doesn't do much good if the whole market gets killed by Ethernet and iSCSI.
Furthermore, Cisco has decided to enter the Fibre Channel market with the spin-in of Andiamo Systems. This market intrusion is the largest event to hit the Fibre Channel switch space in years, and Cisco's considerable marketing muscle and money will likely represent a huge challenge to the existing Fibre Channel switch companies once its products get off the ground.
Brocade still hasn't had an interoperability epiphany, regardless of competing market forces. The vendor's habit of adding useful but incompatible features to its products damages not only Brocade but Fibre Channel as a whole. When confronted with the interoperability issue, Brocade representatives said it is not in the customers' best interest for Brocade to "dumb down" its Fibre Channel fabric to work with other switches. That sentiment might be true if customers wished to purchase only from Brocade; however, we like choices and believe that purchasers of Fibre Channel switches do too.
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