Sun Microsystems and EMC announced the companies will work to provide improved compatibility between Sun Solaris 10 and EMC’s networked storage systems. The two companies also announced a new expanded Cooperative Support Agreement and have extended an agreement that enables Sun to offer the OEM version of EMC Legato NetWorker as its Sun-branded backup and recovery software. EMC intends to port key storage management software to Solaris 10 including EMC PowerPath and EMC Legato NetWorker as well as software from its EMC Documentum, EMC Legato and EMC Smarts product line. EMC and Sun said the alliance comes at the request of users.

“The needs of customers must always come first and with this collaboration, our companies are taking another step to prove that,” said Howard Elias, executive vice president of corporate market at EMC. “As Sun delivers Solaris across multiple platforms, EMC will be a key enabler for our joint customers to deploy it as part of an information lifecycle management strategy that drives efficiencies and productivity.” Sun president and COO Jonathan Schwartz said Sun’s growth in the x64 server space has generated increased demand for Solaris 10. “Customers expect our companies to be working closely together and we are delighted to collaborate with EMC on support for Solaris 10,” he said.