There was a lot of speculation around the VMware acquisition of Akimbi... just how much did they pay for it?  Numbers were floating around, but I hadn't seen anything concrete in the press about it, until now.

According to the Dow Jones News Wire, it looks like Akimbi sold for around $59 million.  Not a bad multiplier when you stop to think about it... from Akimbi's point of view.  With only $8 million invested in the company, and with only around 18 months of runway underneath their belt, the company was able to get more than a 7x multiplier.  The Akimbi product was fairly cheap in price, so I can't imagine that their annual revenue was that high.  The report stated that EMC aggressively pursued the company... and with a 7x purchase price, they must have REALLY wanted the technology.

While closed only last year, Fund XII has already seen its first exit with the sale of virtualization technology developer Akimbi Systems Inc. to VMware Inc. in June. Dalal said that while Akimbi, founded in 2004, had raised "around $8 million" in funding, it was sold for a sum "in the neighborhood" of $59 million. Dalal said that Akimbi's technology was such a good fit for EMC Corp.-owned (EMC) VMware that the company pursued Akimbi early and aggressively.