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Chet Lasell
APC
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For Immediate Release

APC Elected to Blade.org Board of Directors

Company's Expertise in the Areas of Power and Cooling and Energy Efficiency will Bolster the Board's Overall Perspective and Capabilities

WEST KINGSTON, R.I., December 18, 2007 -- APC, a global leader in integrated critical power and cooling services, today announced it has been elected as a governing member of Blade.org and will join the organization's Board of Directors. Blade.org is an open community created to develop and advance next-generation solutions for blade servers. As a board member, APC will work with the association to influence and promote the direction of the blade server market and encourage creation of new blade solution offerings.

"We are honored to join the Board of Directors of Blade.org, a well-respected and important organization," said John Tuccillo, vice president of global strategic alliances for APC. "Collaboration among Blade.org members will help develop and deploy blade platform solutions more efficiently, predictably and quickly, advancing the overall industry. We are pleased to have the opportunity to help shape this next evolution in the enterprise data center."

Earlier this year, APC established the Blade.org Power and Cooling Committee, which is co-chaired by company representatives John Tuccillo and Ken Pierrehumbert. The Power and Cooling committee focuses on essential aspects of power and cooling in the blade environment. The committee's primary goals are:

• Identify critical power and cooling needs of the end customer that deploys blade servers.
• Map out elements that contribute to power and cooling efficiency and effectiveness from the processor to the power grid and in between.
• Establish best practices for power and cooling in blade installations.
• Identify power and cooling challenges and trends proposing solutions to the challenges and supporting the trends.

Currently the Blade.org Power and Cooling Committee is hosting a series of energy webinars. The series focuses on helping clients understand how to supply blade-based solutions to boost performance while decreasing energy consumption and costs. For more information on the energy webinar series, please visit www.Blade.org.

"APC's addition to the Blade.org board further strengthens our organization's leadership team and its representation across key segments of the blade community," said Doug Balog, chairman for Blade.org, and vice president of development for IBM BladeCenter. "APC brings a high-degree of technical knowledge and market expertise to our Board of Directors, which will be extremely valuable as we continue to expand the Blade.org community and set ongoing direction for the fast growing organization."

APC is noted for its significant expertise in power and cooling for high density environments. Its newest offering, the APC InfraStruXure® InRow® cooling solution, enables users to effectively reduce the cost and environmental impact of maintaining their high density IT systems. In addition, APC's software solutions enable the user to monitor environmental disruptions throughout the data center to ensure the highest efficiency and eliminate costly downtime.

About APC-MGE

In February 2007, APC and MGE UPS Systems combined to form a $3 billion (€2.4 billion) Critical Power & Cooling Services business unit of Schneider Electric. Together, APC and MGE offer the industry's most comprehensive product and solution range for critical IT and process applications in industrial, enterprise, small and medium business and home environments. APC and MGE solutions include uninterruptible power supplies (UPS), precision cooling units, racks, and design and management software, including APC's InfraStruXure® architecture the industry's most comprehensive integrated power, cooling, and management solution. Backed by the industry's broadest service organization and an industry leading R&D investment, the combined company's 12,000 employees help customers confront today's unprecedented power, cooling and management challenges. Schneider Electric, with 112,000 employees and operations in 190 countries, had 2006 annual sales of $18 billion (€13.7 billion). For more information on APC and MGE, please visit www.apc-mge.com. All trademarks are the property of their owners.

About Blade.org

Blade.org is a collaborative vendor and end-user community focused on accelerating the development and adoption of blade server solutions. The organization provides leadership to the blade market and fosters a thriving industry ecosystem focused on delivering valuable solutions to blade computing customers. More information is available at www.blade.org.

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