Virtual Iron Software (
www.virtualiron.com), the leading provider of enterprise server virtualization made easy, today announced outstanding results for its second half 2007. The announcement comes on the heels of
$20 million in new equity financing for the company and dramatic growth in revenue, channel and customers, as well as the broad expansion of its product platform and partner ecosystem.
The announcement was made at the InfoWorld Virtualization Executive Forum, taking place today in San Francisco. Virtual Iron president and CEO Ed Walsh will be delivering a keynote address at the conference where he will discuss the emergence of server virtualization and its growing impact on the entire data center ecosystem. Two of Virtual Iron’s end-user customers will also address the conference.
“The server virtualization market is exploding and Virtual Iron continues to outpace the market and every one of its competitors,” said Ed Walsh, CEO of Virtual Iron. “This momentum is a direct result of the value our products deliver for our customers and partners. We’re providing users with all the benefits of enterprise server virtualization without the cost and complexity. There is tremendous demand for an alternative in the market today as evidenced by our success to date.”
The server virtualization software market is growing at 60% per year according to IDC and is expected to reach over $9 billion by the year 2012, but user adoption, only at 6% today, has been hindered by the complexity and high price of established commercial solutions. Virtual Iron addresses this gap by offering the only comparable enterprise-class alternative to VMware, in the industry’s easiest-to-use package. Since coming to market in Fall of 2006, the company has leveraged this advantage to gain significant traction in the mainstream market. Some of the company’s recent highlights include:
$20 Million in New Financing
Virtual Iron secured $20 million in new venture equity financing in January 2008. The funding, provided at an increased valuation, will be used to accelerate product development and expand global sales, marketing and distribution efforts. The investment brings Virtual Iron’s total venture funding to $65 million in invested equity capital and includes Highland Capital Partners, Matrix Partners, Goldman Sachs, Intel Capital and SAP Ventures.
Increasing Revenue Growth and Customer Traction
Virtual Iron’s software is now deployed in over 1,450 organizations worldwide, including all market segments and industries. 40% of the company’s 2007 revenues and customers came from outside of North America. The company also saw a significant demand for its more advanced capabilities, with over 60% of its users leveraging the product’s policy-based automation capabilities to support efforts such as transparent workload migration, high availability, automated failover and dynamic load balancing.
Worldwide Channel Growth
Virtual Iron has adopted a 100% channel distribution strategy that maximizes both product and services opportunities for its partners. This enables value-added resellers to deliver complete solutions to their customers that include servers, SAN, storage, software and professional services. In 2007, the company achieved a number of important milestones in this area:
- The company expanded its distribution network in North America and Europe - signing Tier 1 distribution agreements with Tech Data Corporation and Avnet. It also expanded its distribution network in Asia-Pacific.
- Its channel network grew by almost 10X – from 40 partners at the end of 2006 to 375 channel partners at the end of 2007.
- Virtual Iron signed new reseller agreements with Dell, HP and Arrow Electronics.
- It also made major investments in reseller channel enablement and support, significantly increasing the number of Revenue Producing VARS and VAR Sales Reps.
Industry Product Validation
Virtual Iron continued to expand its product footprint in the second half of 2007 with two major releases. The product was also evaluated, recognized and favorably compared to the market leader in a number of independent lab-based product reviews including:
Growing Technology Partner Ecosystem
Virtual Iron also continued to expand its ecosystem of technology partners including:
- New and expanded agreements and collaboration with multiple server, storage, processor and virtualization technology partners: Compellent, EqualLogic, FalconStor, HP, IBM, Intel, LeftHand Networks, Microsoft, NetApp and PlateSpin, among others
- Qualification for IBM Advanced Partner Status based on its continued sales, marketing and product development contributions to IBM and the optimization of Virtual Iron’s solutions for IBM's computing platforms
- Participation in Microsoft’s Virtualization Validation Program and Interoperability Alliance