FMS 2020: Fibre Channel Industry Association Evolves to Meet Storage Networking Requirements

In conjunction with its sponsorship of the FMS, The Fibre Channel Industry Association (FCIA) provided updates to several new FC standards, continuing the ongoing development of the network protocol of choice for data center storage.

In addition, FCIA announced IBM Corp. has joined its ranks as a principal member company and that distinguished engineer Patty Driever of IBM has been elected to its board of directors.

“As evidenced from the new technical work being completed, FC is a proven protocol for networked datacenter storage that just keeps getting better,” said Mark Jones, president, FCIA; and director, technical marketing, Broadcom Inc. “FCIA is pleased to be sponsoring FMS this year and also thrilled to welcome IBM as a member. Looking to 2021 and beyond, FC has a clear road ahead and will provide users with a return on their investment for years to come.”

FCIA Standard Updates
The T11 Technical Committee which maintains responsibility for the technical work of FC has reported that innovations to the FC standards continue.

Updates include:

• FC-PI-7P, the standard that defines 4 lane 256GFC, has completed public review and is nearing INCITS publication.
• Improvements have been made to the switched architecture and the fabric services. FC-SW-7 and FC-GS-8 standards have been published.
• The approval of a new project, FC-PM, defines how FC is used as a transport for persistent memory environments.
• Improvements have been made to the base FC architecture to improve fabric notification/congestion management.

“Even though FC is a tried and true technology, the standard continues to evolve with ongoing work and a robust roadmap,” said Steve Wilson, chairman, T11 Technical Committee; and director, technology and standards, Broadcom. “Data center networking continues to be a critical piece of thepuzzle in designing technology solutions to solve complex business problems and FC has the attributes to solve those challenges.”

Meet Patty Driever

As the most recent addition to the FCIA board of directors, she is a distinguished engineer working for IBM in Poughkeepsie, NY where she is currently driving storage I/O and networking technology and architecture offerings for the IBM Z and LinuxONE platforms. She currently represents IBM in the INCITS T11 FC standards development committee and serves as an officer of T11. She has held a variety of technical and management positions in IBM throughout her career. Beyond her service on the FCIA board, she also serves as president of a not-for-profit childcare center in Poughkeepsie, Community Family Development, which provides high-quality child-care services and developmentally appropriate early childhood and youth programs to a diverse population in the city of Poughkeepsie.  

“I am thankful to be joining the remarkable group of leaders guiding the association and FC industry forward,” said Driever. “Customers continue to rely on FC to provide the security, reliability and performance for their organization’s most premium data and all indications are this trend will continue.“

Newly released 2020 FC Solutions Guide and other valuable resources

Live on Tuesday, November 11 join FCIA members Marcus Thordal and AJ Casamento, principal solutions architects, Broadcom, as they give a presentation at the FMS TechZone titled: The Most Reliable Network for NVMe-oF