NetApp sees IBM/Cisco VersaStack as 'huge' threat to FlexPod NetApp has inadvertently leaked competitive intelligence documents to a community newsfeed, and the contents reveal it worries that IBM and Cisco's VersaStack will threaten its FlexPod business and that SolidFire has emerged as a threat. Several documents penned by the “NetApp Competitive Advantage Team” have reached a public …
Per the community site: "Any documents, papers, text, data, or other information posted by NetApp on the Site is and shall remain the sole property of NetApp and may not be copied, modified, moved, translated, adapted, distributed or displayed without NetApp’s prior written permission." (Ironic I just did that, but you did seem to violate these terms by re-printing content you found on their site).
Also in the Code of Conduct on their site: "You will not disclose any third party confidential information." This information was clearly meant to be confidential, and you knew that when you reported on it (and admitted as much).
By publishing/reporting this information you have knowingly impaired a corporation's ability to conduct business as it sees fit. This isn't the same as someone leaking government documents as the government is a public entity. Netapp is a private firm, and someone seems to have made an honest mistake that you have exploited to promote some Anti-Netapp agenda. I believe an example needs to be made of you guys, this is NOT the kind of technical information I expect to read from an industry site.
If you want to work for Gawker go do so.
Shameful.
This is NOT journalism. It serves no public good to reveal the confidential internal business documents of a private company. Notice that no other respectable industry site or news source did the same.
Journalism is supposed to come with a high regard for the ethicality of what one reports and how one obtains information. The Reg jumped at the chance to take advantage of someone's obvious mistake and crossed the line from Journalism to corporate espionage, and should be dealt with accordingly.
My opinion.
Robert,
NetApp is a public company. In the data protection business. And for years it has leaked company data into a public forum that I am able to access over RSS without login and without a view of the T&Cs.
All you need to do to see this stuff is look in the right place.
A place, by the way, that has also regularly been spammed by third parties over the years. Often with pr0n. Now >that's< the kind of security I expect from my storage provider. Not.
I have no agenda regarding NetApp. None.
But when I see a company unable to manage its own affairs, and leaking evidence of that, it's the job to report it.
Simon
This post has been deleted by its author
This can't be serious, IBM did so poorly with x86 sales they had to sell both their PC division and their server division to Lenovo. They also failed miserably at PureSystems. How would one expect that they could execute on this. I can't see this being a threat to anyone. NetApp or otherwise.
Guess you didn't read the article so I'll summarize for you. Versastack is not an IBM x86 solution. It's IBM Storage (Storwize V7000) with Cisco UCS servers and networking. IBM has actually done really well with the Storwize products.
I guess you didn't read my comment where the key words are sell and execute, not x86, so I will summarize it for you. I understand that the solution uses IBM Storage and Cisco x86 servers. Duh, IBM no longer has x86 servers. My point was that someone at IBM has to sell it and IBM sucks at marketing, selling and executing on these types of x86 solutions even if it is Cisco who is the x86 part of the solution and not IBM. Partners are not going to sell this because they have been burned by to many IBM solutions like this in the past. Also partners sell what they know and this is new, so they won't be pushing it any time soon. Cisco reps aren't going to sell this because they don't sell storage, so that leaves it to IBM to sell this x86 solution product themselves. Which again, they suck at. My point again is Seriously? An IBM x86 solution being a threat to anyone? Not.
Somebody here has strange ideas about journalism. Journalism succeeds by publishing stories that people want to read, and this one has apparently succeeded. Ha! The real joke is the concept of competitive marketing at Netapp. I work for Tegile and am delighted to see Netapp talking trash about us.
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