Dell has taken significant steps over the past three years to expand its enterprise presence as a complete solutions provider. In addition to strategic acquisitions, such as Force10, Dell expects to hire several hundred new team members in engineering, sales and marketing, and services jobs at the Dell Silicon Valley R&D Center.

“The addition of Force10 Networks technology gives Dell a data center-class networking portfolio, enabling the company to deliver on converged infrastructure,” said Cindy Borovick, research vice president, data center networking, IDC. “Force10 Networks technology architecture will integrate well within Dell's virtual data center vision.”

Dell recognizes that the network infrastructure to deliver applications or information is critical, regardless of location or end point device. Dell sees the data center as the focal point and its network must be transformed into a streamlined, efficient, and policy-driven network that is responsive to changing applications and end-user demands.

“Data center networking is going through a significant transformation to support applications and virtualization and meet the needs of end users and IT administrators. Simply put, customers need a new approach, which is what we are calling Virtual Network Services Infrastructure,” said Dario Zamarian, vice president and general manager, Dell Networking. “Force10’s history of product innovation and technology leadership in data center networking matches and accelerates our vision.”