Foundry helps retail giant to provide state-of-the-art connectivity at its new prestigious mall in Abu Dhabi and several new projects across the region

DUBAI, March 10, 2008: Foundry Networks®, Inc., a performance and total solutions leader for end-to-end switching and routing, has been cited as a preferred vendor by EMKE Group, a retail giant that operates popular brands of retail chain stores that include the renowned Lulu chain of supermarkets, department stores, hypermarkets and now shopping malls. EMKE Group has been working with Foundry for all its real estate projects across the Middle East since 1999.

According to Madhava Rao, Group IT Manager, EMKE Group, "We have been working with Foundry Networks for a long time and are very happy with its products, service and support. We see them as an essential partner that understands our needs and provides us with the level of support our projects demand."

EMKE Group's recent project, the Khalidiya Mall, is another great example of this "partnership". Positioned as a prestigious commercial project in Abu Dhabi, the team at EMKE wanted to ensure that Khalidiya Mall had one of the best IT and networking infrastructures in the region. It designed the network for the mall at its early stages to be able to cater to its existing and future needs not just for the mall management, but from the tenants' point of view as well. Khalidiya Mall is located in one of Abu Dhabi's most affluent neighbourhoods and home to the world's premium brands.

Madhav continued, "Our tenants can access all our services from the comfort of their office, through a secure intranet that allows for direct communication between themselves and mall management with immediate action. This makes us answerable and helps us to provide the best service in the region. We rely on infrastructure vendor partners like Foundry Networks to help us achieve our objectives."

The mall uses Intelligent Building Management Systems (IBMS) to enable it to provide special facilities management services like generating monthly consumption bills for chilled water and other services, as well as allowing the tenant to access (in a secure environment) the system to log requests for special promotional space within the mall, facility management requests, etc and be able to monitor these requests as it is processed by the Mall's management.

The sophisticated network set up by the Group's IT team at Khalidiya Mall also offers select managed services to its tenants like Internet access, online and desktop security, print facilities, and other key applications.

Foundry plays an active role in ensuring that this network runs smoothly and effectively. As its "preferred switching and backbone vendor", Foundry has provided EMKE with a wide variety of networking products including FastIron SuperX 10 gigabit Ethernet (10GbE)-capable Layer 2/3 core switches, the FastIron and EdgeIron families of 10GbE-ready Layer 2/3 edge switches. Foundry's high-performance and scalable switching solution helps connect EMKE's data points and voice points.

"Our directive was clear - we had to work with the IT team at EMKE Group to provide them with the capability to offer the range of services that would not only cater to its tenants' needs today, but be scalable for future applications," said Farook Majeed, regional manager, Middle East for Foundry Networks. "There were distance challenges because of the sheer scale of the project, but through deploying the right switches in strategic areas within the structured cabling, EMKE Group's IT division were able to provide its networking and access to its tenants spread over one million square feet and three levels."

EMKE Group's IT team trained with Foundry and are certified to provide the first level of support. The partnership with Foundry also includes "next day" technical support, and five year guaranteed support on all its products with advanced RMA (spares) support though EMKE keep a supply of these spare parts themselves.

"We do not drop and change our vendors with each project," said Madhav. "We prefer to continue to work with a vendor like Foundry who has worked with us to provide not only the right technology solutions, but also provids us with the right partner to work with for each project in each country across the Middle East. This ensures that we get the right level of on-site support tailored for each project."

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About Foundry Networks
Foundry Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ: FDRY) is a leading provider of high-performance enterprise and service provider switching, routing, security and Web traffic management solutions, including Layer 2/3 LAN switches, Layer 3 Backbone switches, Layer 4-7 application switches, wireless LAN and access points, metro and core routers. Foundry's customers include the world's premier ISPs, metro service providers, and enterprises, including e-commerce sites, universities, entertainment, health and wellness, government, financial and manufacturing companies. For more information about the company and its products, call 1.888.TURBOLAN or visit www.foundrynet.com.

© Press Release 2008