Sun to Acquire HighGround Systems

Deal to Provide Customers with Easy-to-Use Storage Management Solutions

(05 December 2000) Sun Microsystems announced today that it plans to acquire HighGround Systems, Inc., in a stock-for-stock transaction.

HighGround Systems, a privately held, 170-person company based in Marlborough, Mass., is the leading developer of storage resource management software for open systems. The company's products help customers understand and control their storage resources.

"With the acquisition of HighGround Systems, Sun is liberating system administrators from the daunting task of managing complex storage environments," said Ed Zander, Sun's president and chief operating officer.

The acquisition of HighGround will enable Sun to take a lead in the emerging worldwide storage resource management market, which the Gartner Group's Dataquest Research Division estimates will reach $1.7 billion by 2003.

"With this acquisition, Sun is building on its strategy to deliver easily managed, scalable storage networks to its customers," said Janpieter Scheerder, Sun's executive vice president, Network Storage. "We continue to aggressively round out our solutions with customer-oriented, high value products and, most importantly, we continue to build our arsenal to take on the competition and increase market share."

Under the terms of the merger agreement, Sun will acquire HighGround in a stock-for-stock transaction worth approximately $400 million. All HighGround employees and products will become a part of Sun.

The acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter of Sun's fiscal year 2001, which ends March 30, and is subject to government review, HighGround stockholder approval and customary closing conditions.

Amanda McVitty Marketing Communications Manager SolNet Ltd. PO Box 397 Wellington New Zealand

Phone: 64-4-462-0700 Fax: 64-4-462-0775 DDI: 64-4-462-0724 Mobile: 021-898-798 Email: amandam@newzealand.sun.com

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