Landmark Introduces Panasas Solutions To Accelerate Seismic-Processing Application Performance

HOUSTON- Landmark, a product service line of Halliburton's (NYSE: HAL)
Drilling and Evaluation Division, today announced that it is introducing a
parallel storage system that addresses the E&P industry's need for powerful
new technologies to process seismic data more quickly.

The move comes as the result of a preferred-reseller and
strategic-development agreement between Landmark and Panasas, Inc., a leader
in parallel storage solutions. The agreement, which adds Panasas® ActiveStor
storage clusters to Landmark's portfolio of optimized computing solutions
for seismic processing, means that Landmark has tested one of the IT
industry's best purpose-built high performance storage technologies -
confirming that it is optimized for the unique needs of both small and large
E&P companies and seismic processing vendors.

The agreement is well-timed because E&P companies are consistently acquiring
huge volumes of new seismic data and also re-analyzing their existing data
sets, a phenomenon that often makes it necessary for these companies to
process massive, terabyte-level data files. As a result, they are becoming
increasingly reliant on their High-Performance Computing (HPC)
infrastructures, especially for high input/output jobs.

"High Performance Computing can experience application performance
challenges when processing seismic data," said Chris Usher, senior director
of technology at Landmark. "This is especially true if the infrastructure is
supported by conventional storage technologies, which can't keep pace with
the parallel processing functions required for most seismic processing
jobs."

As a result, processing hardware must wait while storage systems strain to
catch up - creating a textbook input/output bottleneck. Panasas ActiveStor
parallel storage clusters, which include the company's PanFST parallel file
system, eliminate these input/output bottlenecks, leading to significantly
improved application performance, linear scalability and higher overall
utilization of compute clusters. They are also highly reliable, easy to
manage and competitively priced - providing the customer with a high value
per terabyte.

"Our agreement with Panasas enables Landmark to offer seismic processing
customers of all sizes the advanced storage solutions they've been
requesting for their seismic processing infrastructures - at extremely
attractive prices," said Usher. "It demonstrates that we are delivering
complete solutions for High Performance Computing environments, including a
range of bundles consisting of Panasas ActiveStor storage, Linux clusters
and our ProMAX SeisSpace® software line, as well as related consulting and
services offerings."

Victor Perez, CEO of Panasas, underscored the strong customer benefits from
this partnership: "Panasas' application-optimized solutions represent the
standard in parallel file system and parallel storage technology. Partnering
with an E&P solutions market-leader like Landmark will allow customers to
achieve a competitive advantage in their race to discover energy resources
and generate higher revenues."

Panasas' parallel storage clusters are especially valuable in seismic
processing environments because they can scale easily and quickly without
disruption. In fact, the storage clusters increase overall processing speed
as customers add capacity to their infrastructures. Landmark and its
customers have seen throughput double when increasing storage capacity with
ActiveStor parallel storage clusters. And since processor speeds and
densities are steadily growing, it is becoming increasingly critical to add
purpose-built storage for high-performance environments.

Because such environments can be complex to set up and administer, Panasas
has designed its ActiveStor storage clusters as an 'appliance' - offering
customers a significant deployment and on-going administration advantage,
especially those with limited IT staffs.

Landmark's seismic processing R&D group has complemented its agreement with
Panasas by extensively optimizing its seismic processing software for High
Performance Computing environments, including Landmark's popular line of
ProMAX SeisSpace software . As a result, the software can take full
advantage of cutting-edge high performance parallel storage systems for more
effective data processing. Landmark currently offers the software as a
bundled solution with Panasas ActiveStor parallel storage clusters.

"Our seismic processing software optimization is a great example of how
Landmark works 'hand in glove' with innovative hardware vendors to enhance
software - something we've also done successfully with companies like NVIDIA
and Intel," concluded Usher.