As expected by many since the introduction of the new CCIE Data Center certification track, today Cisco officially announced that they are retiring the CCIE Storage Networking track. The last day to test for the CCIE Storage Networking written exam is April 30th, 2013, while the last day for testing the CCIE Storage Networking lab exam is June 30th 2013. Per the announcement:

The CCIE Storage Networking certification is being retired because of its increasingly narrow focus within IT networking and the broader scope now available with the Data Center training and certification programs. While the job roles of professionals working in the storage networking area remain important for a company’s success, Cisco is concentrating its focus on the broader solutions that exist for the data center as a whole.

While many of the SAN switching topics overlap between CCIE Storage Networking and CCIE Data Center, such as VSANs, Basic & Enhanced Zoning, SAN Trunking & Port Channeling, iSCSI, and San Extension with FCIP, many features covered in CCIE SAN are not being carried over to CCIE DC, such as FICON, Inter-VSAN Routing (IVR), Storage Media Encryption (SME), and Data Mobility Manager (DMM). Instead, the SAN section of CCIE Data Center focuses more on storage features of the modern data center such as Unified I/O, Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE), N-Port Virtualization (NPV), and N Port Identifier Virtualization (NPIV).

If you're interested in learning more about storage networking, especially within the scope of CCIE Data Center, check out our CCIE Data Center :: Storage video series. All Access Pass members can access the playlist of this series directly here.