ShoreGroup Announces Sixth U.S. Patent for Identifying, Diagnosing, and Documenting Problems in Computer Networks

Revolutionary technology in the CaseSentry Systems Management solution optimizes the visual representation of the known status of the network

NEW YORK, NY. November 2, 2009 — ShoreGroup, Inc., a premier converged network and systems management solutions and IT professional services firm, is pleased to announce that the United States Patent and Trademark Office granted the company its sixth in a series of allowed patents for systems management technology. US Patent No. 7,600,160 was issued on October 6, 2009 and is entitled "Method and Apparatus for Identifying Problems in Computer Networks."

This patent, representing over ten years of research and development, extends upon the first five patents (issued between April 2006 and April 2009) to the heart of the underlying architecture of ShoreGroup's CaseSentry systems and application availability management solution. This patent addresses how CaseSentry automates the process of identifying, diagnosing, and documenting the current state of the network based on known network or system objects and then detecting deviations from the known state of the network and reporting such discovered deviations as faults requiring a level of human action. The CaseSentry Systems Management solution is available as part of a comprehensive, cost effective management service solution that includes system management consultation, implementation, maintenance and change management.

CaseSentry's architecture provides a powerful foundation from which a variety of systems and application management capabilities are performed, including end-to-end monitoring, diagnosing and documenting problems that impact systems and processes within a complex network environment. This newest patent joins together the intellectual property claims of all previous patents extended to CaseSentry to provide unparalleled real-time end-to-end visibility into the health of networked systems and applications.

From a single platform, CaseSentry utilizes periodic polling and collection of object-generated trap data, without agents or other intrusive means that can impact system and network performance, to monitor the status of objects in a networked environment, and specifically to the technique of verifying the abnormal state of an object before opening a case in its case management system and generating notification alerts. CaseSentry's patented architecture substantially reduces the number of non-root cause error reports within a network hierarchy by verifying abnormal status reports from networked objects and separately identifying the highest object in any parent/child dependency relationship that has an abnormal status. These advanced processes automate the root cause problem determination, thereby streamlining the support process, reducing down time, and increasing the level of service that IT delivers to the business.

ShoreGroup's CaseSentry systems management patent portfolio extends to include management of large-scale enterprise environments that span multiple network technologies and network events (faults, performance, security, etc.) through use of virtual state machines, which run from persistent storage to increase their availability and performance while providing real-time information collection and assessment of network performance and service indicators. CaseSentry's state machines contain agent-less system and application-specific management instruction logic that provide both the speed and flexibility to adapt to changing network conditions and to supplement the discovery and validation process for managed objects to quickly detect and validate events that are impacting critical business processes.

Commenting on the patent, Robert Bojanek said, "With our sixth U.S. patent for the advanced methodology that our CaseSentry management solution employs, ShoreGroup and CaseSentry are again recognized for pioneering technology that streamlines system and application monitoring into one process, and reduces the time and cost of network operations management. Our patented technology and innovation are derived from meeting our customers’ demand for accuracy, speed and reliability in system and application monitoring, protection and optimization."

"CaseSentry's layer model representation for different applications and network devices enables accurate correlation of complex events across disparate platforms and devices, providing secure and robust monitoring and troubleshooting capabilities," said Jason Kaplan, ShoreGroup's Director of Development. "The CaseSentry solution is easily deployed, non-intrusive, highly scalable, and has continually proven to be the glue that manages and monitors resources that are transparent to users, while providing the quickest possible time-to-remediation through identification of the root cause of problems that frequently arise across large, complex, multi-vendor integrated networks."

About ShoreGroup, Inc.

ShoreGroup delivers a complete portfolio of industry-leading management applications, maintenance solutions, professional services and products for unified communications networks. ShoreGroup develops innovative management applications on its dynamic CaseSentry® platform, eliminating the pitfalls of traditional management systems to enable IT, telecom and contact center support organizations to easily and effectively manage availability, performance, service levels and support processes for complex networked environments. The company's ShorePatrol™ Remote Management Service delivers the high-quality unified communications monitoring, maintenance and support that organizations rely upon to ensure the availability of their vital business processes.

ShoreGroup's professional service solutions provide leading consultation, design and implementation services for high-availability networks. The company's expertise in unified communications including IP Telephony/VoIP and IP contact centers, LAN/WAN, data center, telepresence, wireless and security produces manageable solutions that optimize business processes, communications, employee productivity and accessibility to enable organizations to derive the maximum business value from their information technology investment. As a Cisco Gold Certified Partner with advanced specializations, ShoreGroup's service portfolio is backed by solid industry credentials.

Cisco and Cisco Systems are registered trademarks of Cisco Systems, Inc. in the U.S. and certain other countries. ShoreGroup and ShorePatrol are trademarks, and CaseSentry is a registered trademark of ShoreGroup, Inc. All other marks are property of their respective owners.