Bull announces the establishment of the Net Infrastructure & Systems Division

Prague, Oct 31 (PROTEXT) - Bull (http://www.bull.com), aleading world supplier of magnetic and smart cards, ATMs, paymentterminals, computer products and IT solutions, announces theestablishment of the Net Infrastructure & Systems Division in theCzech Republic.

The Net Infrastructure & Systems Division will deal withmarketing, technical support, design of comprehensive solutions,and sale of servers, personal computers, notebooks, products fordata backup products and printers. This step is in fullaccordance with the worldwide strategy of the company, one of theleading technological firms dealing with the development andproduction of computer servers.

"The establishment of the Net Infrastructure & SystemsDivision is the logical conclusion of the effort Bull hasexpended in the development of computer technologies. Now in theCzech Republic we are implementing a model with which Bull hashad success not only in its homeland, France, but also in EasternEuropean countries, e.g. Hungary. In the Net Infrastructure &Systems Division we want to concentrate experts with toptechnical knowledge who will be able to offer our clientsprofessional solutions and services", commented Naďa Mrňousová,deputising General Manager of Bull s.r.o. (http://www.bull.cz),on the establishment of new business unit.

Over many years Bull has been participating together with IBMin the development of top UNIX servers based on the Power PCprocessor and in the development of the AIX operating system forthese systems. UNIX servers of the Escala product series aretechnologically developed systems characterised mainly by highperformance, easy expansibility and extraordinary reliability. Inthese 32-bit machines, which can be grouped in clusters, state-of-the-art technologies are implemented. Escala servers are worldclass, a statement supported by the Report of the companyDataquest from August of this year: Bull has recorded a 14.8%increase in the sale of UNIX servers in Western Europe incomparison with last year, while the overall market has reporteda decrease of 1.2%. Bull achieved even better results in France,where the increase in sales represented 33.6%, whereas the totalmarket decreased by 9.7%. These numbers rank Bull in 4th positionbehind Sun, Hewlett-Packard and IBM.

When it comes to servers based on the Intel processor, Bulldeals with the development of its own series of Express5800 high-performance systems with Pentium processors. At present, Bull isone of the small number of companies to have successfullydeveloped a server based on the latest revolutionary 64-bitprocessor Intel Itanium.

In the Czech Republic the Net Infrastructure & SystemsDivision is headed by Dan Ševčík who came over to Bull from AvnetComputer Marketing, Hall-Mark Division, a leading distributor ofIBM and Sun Microsystems products. "In the Czech Republic Bullhas a good name as a supplier of professional products andservices. At the same time, the Czech market continues to have apositive relation to high-quality and reliable products despitethe worldwide crisis in the area of IT technologies", said DanŠevčík. "Our advantage is Bull's strong technological backgroundsupported by worldwide strategic contracts with important sub-suppliers, in particular, with NEC, EMC2, and Exabyte."

About Bull

Bull is an international computer company with customers inmore than a hundred countries. In 2000, Group turnover was 3.244billion euros. Bull's strategy is focused on Internetinfrastructures and secure services designed to help customerstransform their processes and infrastructures, to take fulladvantage of the net economy. The group is organised around twoindependent entities: Integris, a pan-European service company,supplying consultancy, systems integration and professionalservices, mainly in the Telecommunications, Internet solutionsand Facilities Management fields, and Bull Infrastructure &Systemes which, thanks to its unique technological expertise inEurope, offers "internet-ready" systems and Internetinfrastructure solutions with guaranteed performance, scalabilityand availability. To find out more, visit our site:http://www.servers.bull.com

Bull s.r.o. offers on the Czech market comprehensiveinformation systems, smart cards and terminals solutions,bancomats, payment systems and high speed printing technologies.During last three years the company Bull s.r.o. achieved strongincrease of turnover, which last year targeted 60 mil. FRF. Seealso http://www.bull.cz

UNIX is a registered trademark of the Open Group. Linux is aregistered trademark of Linus TorvaldsOther company, product, and service names may be trademarks orservice marks of others.

Press contact

If you require more information, please contact NaďaMrňousouvá (nadia.mrnousova@bull.cz) or Dan Ševčík(dan.sevcik@bull.cz).

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