SANTA CLARA, Calif., Nov. 20 -- The Wikimedia Foundation, the non-profit organization that operates Wikipedia and other free-content projects, announced today that it has selected Sun Microsystems Inc. to help it build a secure and scalable open source web infrastructure using Sun Fire x4500 and x4150 servers and Sun StorageTek storage arrays. The collaboration will enable Wikimedia to host ever-increasing volumes of rich media and video content and also support the collaborative development and testing of new Wikipedia content and applications by its global network of users.

“By implementing Sun’s open source MySQL database and Sun Open Storage infrastructure, we are in a position to create a better and faster user experience. This is critical to an organization like ours. We rely on users to collaboratively collect and develop the educational content which we disseminate,” said Erik Möller, deputy director of the Wikimedia Foundation. “By developing the solution on an open source platform, our end-users can more easily collaborate, improve, modify and share information to empower and engage people around the world.”

The new Sun platform will enable Wikipedia to enable users to seamlessly upload files up to 100MB. The free encyclopedia is one of the five most popular web properties in the world, with more than 250 million unique visitors each month and a 100,000-strong community of active volunteer editors. Wikipedia uses MySQL as its primary database software. The Wikimedia Foundation is also a Sun Startup Essentials program member, which has enabled it to get high-performance, enterprise-grade systems at attractive startup prices.

“Wikipedia needed a storage and server platform that can handle the ever-evolving needs of a growing, global community that currently sees more than 10 billion page views per month,” said Juan Carlos Soto, vice president of cloud computing and developer platforms marketing at Sun Microsystems. “With a scalable and secure Sun Fire and Open Storage infrastructure, Sun has created a platform that enhances the experience of Wikipedia users worldwide and contributes to global knowledge creation and sharing over the Web.”

The Sun Open Storage Infrastructure provides continuous easy access to Wikimedia’s data. The Sun Fire X4500 storage server delivers the high performance of a four-way x64 server and the highest storage density available, with up to 48TB in 4U of rack space, and uses the Solaris Operating System to manage and protect data. The Sun Fire x4150 server is a market-leading 2-socket x64 server in a single rack unity.

The Wikimedia Foundation is also in the midst of its fifth annual giving campaign, seeking contributions from thousands of users around the world to help fund technical and administrative costs. Möller adds, “We would like to thank Sun Microsystems for their special pricing and in-kind donation of services and hardware. As a charitable foundation we rely on the support and generosity of partners to help offset costs related to rapid growth in our traffic.”

About Wikimedia Foundation

The Wikimedia Foundation Inc. is a nonprofit, charitable organization dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual content, and to providing the full content of its wiki-based projects to the public free of charge. It operates some of the largest collaboratively-edited reference projects in the world, including Wikipedia, one of the world's 10 most-visited Web sites. For a full list of projects, visit Our projects. All projects of the Wikimedia Foundation are collaboratively developed by volunteers using the MediaWiki software. Their content may be freely used, freely edited, freely copied and freely redistributed subject to the restrictions of that license.

About Sun Microsystems Inc.

Sun Microsystems develops the technologies that power the global marketplace. Guided by a singular vision -- "The Network Is The Computer" -- Sun drives network participation through shared innovation, community development and open source leadership. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the Web at http://sun.com.