NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ: NTAP), formerly Network Appliance, Inc., is a proprietary computer storage and data management company headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. It is a member of the NASDAQ-100 and is also Fortune magazine's fifth best place to work.

Network Appliance, Inc. (NetApp) is one of the largest producers and marketers of data storage systems. NetApp's storage filers attach to networks, enabling the company's corporate clientele to store and share data among employees. The company operates roughly 100 direct sales offices, which sell NetApp's storage devices throughout the world. NetApp's customers include Citicorp Securities, Lockheed, Merrill Lynch, Oracle, Yahoo!, and Texas Instruments.
NetApp, Inc. (NetApp), incorporated in 1992, is a provider of storage and data management solutions. The Company offers solutions for storing, managing, protecting and archiving business data. NetApp’s products and services are designed to meet the requirements and service levels of large enterprises and their business applications. The Company offers storage solutions that incorporate its unified storage platform and the functionality of its data and storage resource management software. NetApp markets and sells its storage data management solutions directly through its worldwide sales force and indirectly through channel partners, such as value-added resellers, systems integrators, distributors, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and strategic business partners. On May 13, 2010, the Company completed the acquisition of Bycast Inc. In January 2011, the Company acquired Akorri Networks, Inc. In May 2011, the Company purchased external storage systems business from LSI Corporation.
Data ONTAP Software
The Company’s Fabric-Attached Storage (FAS) and V-Series storage solutions are based on Data ONTAP, an operating system that supports any mix of storage area network (SAN), network-attached storage (NAS) and Internet Small Computer System Interface (iSCSI) environments concurrently. This unified storage software platform is compatible with UNIX, Linux, Windows and Web environments. The Data ONTAP operating system provides the foundation to build a shared storage infrastructure and an enterprise-wide data fabric for the full breadth of business applications and data storage and protection requirements. Data ONTAP features scalability, secure multi-tenancy and unification across protocols and disks. Data ONTAP also unifies storage efficiency, data management and data protection delivery.
Storage Efficiency
NetApp’s portfolio of efficiency technologies helps its customers reduce their storage spending and get more from storage assets they already own. Some of the efficiency technologies it offers include FlexVol; FlexClone, and Deduplication. FlexVol technology provides thin provisioning through virtual volumes. FlexClone technology enables true data cloning using logical copies that do not require additional physical storage space, and allows for instant replication of data volumes and data sets. Deduplication technology provides the ability to eliminate duplicate data within primary and secondary disk storage environments.
Storage Management and Application Integration Software
The Company’s management software family of products provides a range of storage and data management tools to simplify information technology (IT) administration and enhance flexibility and productivity. It delivers differentiated products and collaborates with industry open standards and interfaces to deliver this value to customers. It has four suites of products targeted to different IT administrative roles: storage suite, server suite, database suite and application suite.
FAS Storage Systems Family
The Company’s family of modular, scalable, highly available, unified networked storage systems provides access to a full range of enterprise data for users on a variety of platforms. The FAS 6000, FAS 3000, and the FAS 2000 series of fabric-attached enterprise storage systems are designed to consolidate UNIX, Windows, NAS, iSCSI, SAN and Web data in central locations running over standard connection types: Gigabit Ethernet, FC and parallel SCSI (for backup).
V-Series Family
The Company’s V-Series is a network-based virtualization solution that consolidates storage from different suppliers behind its data management interface, providing SAN, iSCSI and NAS access to the data stored in heterogeneous storage arrays. With the V-Series solution, customers are able to: transform existing heterogeneous, multi-vendor storage systems into a single storage pool; simplify storage provisioning and management with Data ONTAP thin provisioning, and lower backup time, space and cost with Data ONTAP Snapshot copies.
Data Protection Software Products
NetApp offers a range of integrated data protection solutions for enterprise customer environments. Snapshot technology enables near-instantaneous, space efficient online backups of large data sets without affecting system performance; SnapRestore technology uses stored Snapshot backups to recover entire file systems or data volumes in seconds, regardless of capacity or number of files; SnapVault and Open Systems SnapVault technologies provide network- and storage-optimized disk-to-disk backup solutions; MetroCluster is a solution that combines array-based clustering with synchronous mirroring designed to deliver continuous availability and zero data loss, and SnapMirror data replication solution provides disaster recovery protection for business-critical data matched to the recovery point objectives and recovery time objectives of customer environments.
Data Retention and Archive Products
NetApp offers a suite of products to help enable data permanence, accessibility and privacy across a variety of different regulations, such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, 21 CFR Part 11, SEC Rule 17a-4 and HIPAA. Its NetApp Flash Cache modules optimize the performance of random read intensive workloads, such as file services and messaging.
Storage Security Products
The Company’s DataFort storage security appliance provides a unified platform for data security and key management across NAS, Internet protocol (IP) SAN, and tape backup environments. The platform combines wire-speed encryption, access controls, authentication and automated key management to provide security for data at rest, while still allowing the capability to search compliant data for legal discovery purposes if the need arises.
The Company competes with EMC, Hitachi Data Systems, HP, IBM, Oracle Corporation, Sun Microsystems and Dell, Inc.

As the company's financial growth suggested, its file servers were becoming fixtures in the corporate workplace. NetApp's storage devices, which were connected directly to a network on the Internet, provided fast, easy access to computerized information in a variety of applications. Coworkers were able to share a word-processing document saved to a server. Oil companies used large NetApp servers to store seismic data. Internet service providers and web sites such as Yahoo used NetApp systems to store e-mail messages generated by their customers. A NetApp server was used to store all the special effects for the film Titanic. As the initial skepticism of NetApp's novel approach to storage waned, with wariness giving way to confidence, NetApp's roster of customers began to include some of the most well known names in the corporate world. By 1998, NetApp's clientele included more than 100 large corporations, distinguished, "blue-chip" concerns such as Boeing, DuPont, Procter & Gamble, Citicorp, NationsBank, and Walt Disney. The company ended the year with revenue above $166 million.
By the end of the 1990s, the corporate storage industry was recording explosive growth, providing fertile ground for NetApp's meteoric rise. Corporate storage needs were increasing by at least 70 percent annually, providing NetApp with a wealth of new business opportunities. To take advantage of the new opportunities, the company completed a second stock offering in April 1999, raising $123 million. In mid-1999, NetApp announced it was moving out of its headquarters in Santa Clara, California, opting for larger quarters to accommodate its growth. In June 1999, the company moved into the first of three buildings in Sunnyvale, California. Once all three buildings were occupied, the NetApp complex was expected to encompass 360,000 square feet. The latter half of the 1990s also included the company's concerted expansion overseas. After opening offices in Europe between 1996 and 1997, NetApp entered the Far East in 1998. Between 1999 and 2000, the company began establishing a presence in Latin America.
As NetApp entered the 21st century, there were numerous signs that its future in the data storage industry would include years of impressive growth. One promising development was the changing composition of the company's customers. Although NetApp could count scores of large, "blue-chip" corporations as customers during the late 1990s, the business they gave to NetApp accounted for less than a third of the company's sales volume. By 2002, a discernible shift in the source of the company's business had occurred, with 60 percent of annual sales coming from customers in financial services, the federal government, telecommunications, energy, and manufacturing. NetApp's customers included ExxonMobil, General Electric, Merrill Lynch, General Motors, and Ford.
Further optimism for the future was justified by growth projections for the corporate storage industry and by the increasing validity of NetApp's technological approach within the industry. Several of the company's larger rivals, such as EMC Corporation, offered large, complex storage boxes that sold for as much as $1 million. In contrast, NetApp's smaller filers sold for as little as $15,000, which could be cobbled together to form a system comprising as many as thousands of the company's devices. Based on the financial well-being of NetApp and EMC, NetApp's strategy appeared to enjoy greater market acceptance. According to estimates made by Merrill Lynch, NetApp was expected to exceed $80 million in net income in 2002 on 11 percent growth in revenue to nearly $900 million. EMC, on the other hand, was expected to report a net loss of $188 million for the year, along with a 32 percent drop in sales to $5.2 billion.
Looking ahead from 2002, prognostications were sanguine, an attitude projected by Warmenhoven. By 2006, according to one research firm, the overall storage market was expected to represent $24 billion worth of business, roughly the same level that existed in 2001. During the intervening five years, however, the networked storage facet of the industry was expected to increase from one-third to two-thirds of the market. Such growth translated into annual sales increases of 17 percent within the networked storage niche. Based on these projections, Warmenhoven foresaw NetApp wresting market share away from larger competitors during the five-year period. His declaration, as quoted in the November 25, 2002 issue of Forbes, conveyed the confidence permeating NetApp's Sunnyvale headquarters. In reference to rivals such as EMC, Warmenhoven vowed, "We will push them back in a corner."
Principal Subsidiaries: Network Appliance Ltd.; (U.K.); Network Appliance SARL (France); Network Appliance Srl. (Italy); Network Appliance GmbH (Germany); Network Appliance FSC Incorporated; Network Appliance KK (Japan); Network Appliance Ltd. (Ireland); Network Appliance GmbH (Switzerland); Network Appliance BV (Netherlands); Network Appliance GesmbH (Austria); Network Appliance SL (Spain); Network Appliance Global Ltd. (Bermuda); Network Appliance Denmark ApS; Network Appliance (Australia) Pty Ltd.; Network Appliance Mexico S de RL de CV; Network Appliance Singapore Private Ltd.; Network Appliance (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd; Network Appliance Systems (India) Private Ltd.; Network Appliance Argentina; Network Appliance (Brasil) Ltda.; Network Appliance Canada Ltd.; Network Appliance (Belgium) BVBA; Network Appliance Israel Ltd.; Network Appliance Poland Sp. z.o.o.; Network Appliance Federal Systems, Inc.; Network Appliance South Africa (Pty); Limited Network Appliance Sweden AB.
Principal Competitors: EMC Corporation; Hewlett-Packard Company; International Business Machines Corporation; Hitachi Data Systems Corporation.


OVERALL
Beta: 1.38
Market Cap (Mil.): $19,942.34
Shares Outstanding (Mil.): 367.87
Annual Dividend: --
Yield (%): --
FINANCIALS
NTAP.OQ Industry Sector
P/E (TTM): 33.43 20.83 19.91
EPS (TTM): 74.26 -- --
ROI: 12.35 20.99 15.90
ROE: 21.37 22.83 17.49


Statistics:
Public Company
Incorporated: 1992
Employees: 2,345
Sales: $892.1 million (2003)
Stock Exchanges: NASDAQ
Ticker Symbol: NTAP
NAIC: 334112 Computer Storage Device Manufacturing; 511210 Software Publishers

Key Dates:
1992: Network Appliance is founded.
1993: The company ships its first products in June.
1994: Daniel Warmenhoven is appointed chief executive officer.
1995: Network Appliance completes its initial public offering of stock.
1999: Network Appliance relocates from Santa Clara to Sunnyvale, California.

Name Age Since Current Position
Warmenhoven, Daniel 59 2009 Executive Chairman of the Board
Georgens, Thomas 51 2009 President, Chief Executive Officer, Director
Gomo, Steven 58 2004 Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President - Finance
Salmon, Robert 49 2005 Executive Vice President - Field Operations
Goel, Manish 45 2009 Executive Vice President - Product Operations
Fawcett, Matthew 42 2010 Senior Vice President, General Counsel, Secretary
Mahadevan, Vic 2010 Chief Strategy Officer
Moore, Nicholas 69 2009 Lead Independent Director
Wallace, Richard 50 2011 Director
Allen, Jeffry 58 2005 Independent Director
Wall, Robert 64 1993 Independent Director
Shaheen, George 66 2004 Independent Director
Earhart, Alan 67 2004 Independent Director
Held, Gerald 63 2009 Independent Director
Nevens, Thomas 61 2009 Independent Director


Address:
495 East Java Drive
Sunnyvale, California 94089
U.S.A.
 
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