Red Hat Buys Linux Storage ISV Sistina for $31 Million

Just days after storage heavyweight EMC bought VMware, Red Hat has acquired a Linux storage infrastructure vendor for $31 million in stock.

The Raleigh, N.C., Linux software giant, which continues to build up its open-source infrastructure stack, said Thursday that it plans to buy Sistina Software, of Minneapolis, Minn. Sistina develops storage infrastructure software. The acquisition is expected to be completed in January, Red Hat officials said.

Sistina, which offers a popular clustered file system for Linux, has expertise in storage virtualization and storage area network (SAN) software. Its key products include the Linux-based Logical Volume Manager (LVM) and Sistina GFS for Oracle9i RAC. The combination reduces the complexity of managing an Oracle9i RAC system, according to Red Hat.

Last September, Red Hat unveiled plans to build a fully integrated open-source infrastructure and pledged to offer virtualization and provisioning services for the data center.

The Linux distributor said on Thursday it plans to offer Sistina's file system and storage technologies as open source software. Red Hat said it will make them available as part of a subscription for its enterprise customers in the first half of 2004.

Red Hat's Enterprise Linux 3 upgrade launched in late October.