SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- (Marketwire) -- 02/06/13 -- As part of its ever-expanding Academic Alliances program, NetApp (NASDAQ: NTAP) is launching a new NetApp Certified Storage Associate (NCSA) certification, underscoring its commitment to providing educational opportunities for students of information technology and computer information systems-related programs. In the two years since the launch of NetApp's innovative industry-academic partnership program, students have logged thousands of online training hours reinforcing the fundamental role that storage and data management have in virtual shared infrastructures. Given the increasing demand for storage-savvy college graduates, NetApp is providing students with an entry-level industry credential that will document their expertise and give them additional credibility when entering the job market.

Coinciding with the growing storage-related IT needs among enterprises, greater demand will be placed on IT/CIS professionals who can benefit from a practical data management curriculum. To that end, NetApp recently initiated a range of academic collaborative projects with schools and universities located domestically and abroad, from Germany to Australia, New Zealand, and Singapore. Notably, NetApp engaged with Wake Technical Community College, a two-year accredited technical training school in the Research Triangle region of North Carolina, to develop a new storage-focused curriculum that will prepare students for entry-level customer support roles.

"With the increasing importance for IT workers to understand storage and data management technologies, we wanted to extend our courses and coverage of these topics," said Matthew D. Zullo, Computer Information Technology Department Head, Wake Technical Community College. "Wake Tech has been working with NetApp to develop several exciting new courses on storage and virtualization that will leverage the Academic Alliances curriculum materials and provide our students with broader IT skills and career opportunities."

Internationally, NetApp is working with Singapore Polytechnic, the first polytechnic established in Singapore, to integrate a virtual NetApp® Data ONTAP® storage simulator (VSIM) into its Center for Cloud Computing and Embedded Systems curriculum. This will provide Singapore Polytechnic students with experience working with industry-leading storage management tools.

"Our goal in the Center is to develop a next generation of technologists who are trained in the latest trends and technologies in cloud computing and data center management," said Steven Chew, senior lecturer, technology cluster leader for Cloud Computing & Embedded Systems, School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Singapore Polytechnic. "Incorporating NetApp's storage solutions and materials into our courses gives our students exposure to the industry-leading storage management systems that provide the foundation of today's cloud and data center infrastructures."

While growing its academic partnerships, NetApp has also continued to build on its long-standing technical collaboration with industry leaders such as Teradata. NetApp recently joined the Teradata University Network (TUN) as the newest technology partner to provide TUN's 3,000 faculty members with teaching materials and resources on storage, high-performance computing, big data, and analytic solutions such as Hadoop. Capitalizing on the success of the NetApp FlexPod® solution, which delivers prevalidated architectures and solutions for cloud infrastructures and data center consolidation, NetApp has started expanding its curriculum offerings to include networking and virtualization resources as well.

"With the growth of information, we believe the future of computing will be data centric. To support this, IT communities are going to require an experienced and skilled workforce that understands storage and its important role in data infrastructure," said Regina Kunkle, vice president of State and Local Government and Education, NetApp Public Sector. "We are building programs and alliances within academia and industry to ensure students and graduates entering the job market are fluent in the enabling technologies propelling data-centric organizations."

Additional Resources

• Learn more about the NetApp Academic Alliances Program: http://www.netapp.com/us/company/leadership/academic-alliances
• Follow NetApp on Twitter: www.twitter.com/NetApp
• Join NetApp on Facebook: www.facebook.com/NetApp
• View NetApp videos on YouTube: www.youtube.com/NetAppTV
• Connect with NetApp on LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/groups?about=&gid=111681

About NetApp
NetApp creates innovative storage and data management solutions that accelerate business breakthroughs and deliver outstanding cost efficiency. Discover NetApp's passion for helping companies around the world go further, faster at www.netapp.com. Use of the words "partner" or "partnership" does not imply a legal partnership between NetApp and any other company or entity.

NetApp, the NetApp logo, Go further, faster, Data ONTAP, and FlexPod are trademarks or registered trademarks of NetApp, Inc. in the United States and/or other countries. All other brands or products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders and should be treated as such.

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