GroundWork Launches Version 5 Of GroundWork Monitor Product

INTEROP, New York, September 18, 2006 — GroundWork Open Source, Inc. (www.groundworkopensource.com), the leader in open source-based IT operations management, today announced version 5 of the GroundWork Monitor product line, including GroundWork Monitor Professional, a major upgrade to the company's flagship solution for monitoring the most demanding IT infrastructures, including servers, applications, and networked devices. The new release adds a sophisticated service level monitoring framework, including executive-level dashboards and comprehensive reporting that can meet the unique Service Level Agreement (SLA) reporting requirements of any organization.

The GroundWork Monitor product line includes GroundWork Monitor Open Source — covering basic IT monitoring needs, which is free for download; GroundWork Monitor Small Business — tailored for organizations with up to 50 servers or networked devices to monitor; and GroundWork Monitor Professional — the most comprehensive open source-based IT monitoring software available for a fraction of the cost of complex, proprietary solutions.

"GroundWork makes it possible for organizations to tap into the power of open source, and to stop writing big checks for their network and IT monitoring needs," said Ranga Rangachari, CEO of GroundWork Open Source. "By providing a platform that's optimized for production IT environments, we take the heavy-lifting out of the open source equation for hundreds of customers. That means not only low-cost, but also low maintenance and enterprise-class support and features that can withstand even the most rigorous mission-critical environments."

With version 5 of GroundWork Monitor Professional, both IT Staff and Managed Service Providers (MSPs) can give their customers and end users individually tailored insight into the operations of the IT service infrastructure.

• Executive dashboards give a consolidated view of IT and key business metrics, integrating data from multiple IT and business components including alert, performance and SLA data. Additionally, systems administrators and MSPs can create dashboards that suit individual preferences and achieve the desired management perspectives with drilldown capabilities, while at the same time reveal sensitive data to only those with appropriate authority.
• The Eclipse BIRT reporting engine is also integrated into version 5 of GroundWork Monitor Professional, providing organizations with clear visibility into their IT service levels. Standard service level reports are bundled into GroundWork Monitor Professional for visualizing multiple data feeds, maps and events. The reports provide a consolidated view for monitoring SLAs and OLAs (Operational Level Agreements) for adherence to the principles outlined in ITIL. Additionally, users and MSPs can create customized reports drawn from the data monitored and collected by GroundWork Monitor Professional using the BIRT report designer, available for download at http://download.eclipse.org/birt/downloads/.

"With GroundWork Monitor Professional, we have the data and tools to fine-tune alarms and notifications," said Chuck Edwards, managing partner of Blue Gecko, a MSP in Seattle, WA. "As a long-time customer, I've seen the continued evolution of the product and this latest release, with new dashboard and reporting capabilities, will make it much easier for us to exceed the SLAs we have with our customers."

GroundWork Launches Network Management Suite — Monitoring InteropNET

In addition to the new version of GroundWork Monitor Professional, GroundWork will also be highlighting at the recently introduced Network Management Suite. GroundWork's Network Management Suite will be showcased at InteropNet — the event network for Interop New York — where GroundWork has been selected as the sole "Open Source Network Monitoring" provider.

With the GroundWork Network Management Suite, GroundWork Monitor Professional customers can take advantage of critical network management functionality including auto discovery, active network mapping and sophisticated network protocol analysis. No other commercial open source platform makes it easier to "plug-and-play" today's hottest open source network monitoring and management technologies, including NeDi (http://nedi.sourceforge.net/about.html), Cacti (http://www.cacti.net/), Network Weathermap (http://netmon.grnet.gr/weathermap/) and NTOP (http://www.ntop.org/).

Hundreds of customers use GroundWork Monitor Professional to monitor their IT infrastructures, taking advantage of the latest open source innovations in a framework architected specifically for mid-market and enterprise line-of-business organizations. Additionally, thousands of organizations have downloaded GroundWork Monitor Open Source (http://www.groundworkopensource.com/products/os-overview.html) since its public release in February.

About GroundWork

San Francisco-based GroundWork Open Source, Inc. (www.groundworkopensource.com) is the leader in the fast-growth market for open source IT operations management software. The company integrates, enhances and develops leading open source software to deliver comprehensive IT operations management solutions. With GroundWork solutions, enterprises leverage the flexibility and low cost of open source tools to achieve enterprise-level availability, performance and operational efficiency at a fraction of the cost of commercial software. GroundWork customers represent a variety of industries, including manufacturing, government, financial services, education, and high technology. GroundWork investors are Mayfield and Canaan Partners.

Contact:

Ray George
Page One PR
[email protected]
650-922-3825