BOSTON, MA -- VON Conference (Booth #1101) -- September 19, 2005 -- Sun Microsystems, Inc. (Nasdaq:SUNW) today made the first public demonstration of its upcoming Netra ATCA (advanced telecom computing architecture) blade server powered with the multi-core AMD Opteron processor-and running Solaris 10 Operating System (OS) at the 2005 VON (Voice on the Net) Conference. Sun's ATCA blade platform will be able to support both SPARC(R) and AMD Opteron processor-based blades in the same chassis with choice of operating systems, including the Solaris OS and MontaVista Linux.

The ATCA blade server with the SPARC processor is scheduled for release at the end of 2005 with the AMD Opteron processor-based blade scheduled for release at the end of the first quarter of 2006.

"Today we are demonstrating a major step toward enabling choice in our upcoming ATCA platform. This will be the first carrier grade Sun product to offer AMD Opteron and SPARC processor-based blades with the Solaris OS and Linux support to meet the needs of our NEP and service provider customers," said Raju Penumatcha, VP of Netra Systems and Networking, Sun Microsystems. "This demonstration validates the importance of choice in Sun's ATCA strategy for high-performance, highly available, next-generation telecom services."

Sun will bring the advantages of the proven, carrier grade Solaris 10 OS with a common standards-based management and availability suite to those customers who choose to use the AMD Opteron processor in Sun's ATCA blade platform. This combination will provide high performance carrier grade reliability with a lower total cost of development and ownership for emerging high-bandwidth telephony networks and next generation, IP-based telephony services, such as voice, video and data.

For those customers who require carrier grade Linux on Sun's ATCA blade platform, Sun is announcing support for MontaVista Carrier Grade Edition (CGE). Monta Vista is currently working on an optimized port of its Linux environment for Sun's ATCA blade platform and multi-core AMD Opteron processor-based blade server.

"Network Equipment Providers are looking to MontaVista CGE as their Linux platform of choice for next generation infrastructure," said Peder Ulander, vice president of marketing at MontaVista Software. "We are very excited about Sun's decision to offer MontaVista Linux as their Linux option for its upcoming ATCA blade platform. Sun is recognized as a leader in carrier grade server platforms, and we look forward to working closely with Sun to deliver our Carrier Grade Edition tuned and optimized for Sun's new ATCA blade server."

In addition to Sun's ATCA blade platform demonstration using the AMD Opteron processor, Sun will be demonstrating NTT COMWARE's next-generation SIP application server technology for IP-based "triple-play" services (voice, video and data) on Sun's Netra ATCA blade server and UltraSPARC processor-based ATCA blade running carrier-grade Solaris OS. These demonstrations will take place at Sun's booth, #1101 at VON in Boston, September 19-22.

The combination of the UltraSPARC processor-based ATCA blade running the Solaris 10 OS, NTT COMWARE's best-in-breed SIP application server and NMS Communications' Open Access platform will uniquely enable high performance, highly available triple-play services for emerging fixed mobile convergent networks.

"NTT COMWARE has been working very closely with Sun on our next-generation SIP application server technology and we intend to deploy this technology on Sun's ATCA blade platform to enable triple-play services for our key service provider customers," said a senior vice president with NTT COMWARE. "Leveraging an open, standards-based computing platform like Sun's Netra ATCA blade platform will allow us the flexibility to rapidly deploy revenue-generating services that can easily adapt to evolving marketplace needs."

About Sun Microsystems, Inc.

A singular vision -- "The Network Is The Computer" -- guides Sun in the development of technologies that power the world's most important markets. Sun's philosophy of sharing innovation and building communities is at the forefront of the next wave of computing: the Participation Age. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the Web at http://sun.com.

Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, Sun Fire, Solaris, Netra, and The Network Is The Computer are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States and other countries. All SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Products bearing SPARC trademarks are based upon an architecture developed by Sun Microsystems, Inc. AMD, Opteron, the AMD logo, the AMD Opteron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices.