Sun Microsystems, the creator of the Solaris Operating System (OS), and Mentor Graphics Corporation today announced that Mentor Graphics would begin qualifying and supporting selected Mentor products on x64/x86 platforms running the Solaris 10 Operating System (OS). This outlines Mentor Graphics' intent to include market leading products BoardStation XE, Calibre nmDRC and LVS, Design for Test suite, and O-In product lines in the Questa functional verification platform.

"In cooperation with Sun, we are focused on providing products by the end of this calendar year running on x64/x86 platforms powered by the Solaris 10 OS, which address many different areas of design and design flow," said Greg Hinckley, President, Mentor Graphics. "This combination of market leading applications, the Solaris 10 OS and Sun's powerful x64/x86 workstations and servers is anticipated to provide optimal solutions for engineering teams developing next-generation system-on-chip and printed circuit board designs."

"Mentor Graphics and Sun have a long history of collaboration, so it's natural that we would expand our partnership," said John Fowler, Executive Vice President, Sun Microsystems. "Solaris, as the only UNIX OS that runs on x64/x86-based systems, is ideally suited to address the challenges of deep sub-micron design."

"We are pleased to see these two industry leading companies, Sun Microsystems and Mentor Graphics, collaborating in this fashion," said Toshiaki Machida, General Manager of NEC Electronics' Development Support Center, Technology Foundation Development Operation Unit. "With Mentor Graphics providing support for the Solaris 10 OS running on platforms such as the "Sun Fire x64/x86 servers, NEC can effectively leverage the depth of in-house Solaris expertise to provide the robust design infrastructure needed to bring next generation products to market."

"Our infrastructure investment is protected," continued NEC's Machida, "with the guaranteed forward compatibility of the Solaris operating system, which ensures that our engineers can count on application and infrastructure stability throughout the lifetime of our evermore complex development projects" - Sun Microsystems.