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Cloudy file-sharing cash rains onto Nasuni

Growth priority causes delayed cash flow break-even gratification

Cloud storage gateway and enterprise file services startup Nasuni has had a funding round to grow its business further expansion in Fortune 500 and Global 2000 companies, meaning expansion outside North America.

The startup says it has doubled the amount of customer data under its management to 12PB in the last 12 months.

Nasuni was founded in 2008 and has developed its storage gateway and UniFS filesystem services software to store, protect, share and access enterprise files, with sync and share being added in August.

Nasuni has had five funding rounds we know about:

  • 2009 - $8m A-round
  • 2010 - $15m B-round
  • 2012 - $20m C-round
  • 2014 - $10m D-round
  • 2016 - $17.5m E-round and $7.5m venture debt financing

That totals $78m but Nasuni says its total venture capital funding is now $80.5m meaning there is a $10m round or rounds we don’t know about.

The latest VC round was led by new investor, Sigma Prime Ventures. All previous investors – Flybridge Capital Partners, North Bridge Venture Partners, Sigma Partners, and a large strategic investor – participated in this new round.

The venture debt financing (VDF), from Eastward Capital, differs from normal venture capital (VC) in that VC funding typically involves getting a piece of the company’s equity. VDF is a loan which is combined with a warrant or right to buy equity to provide security against the higher risk of default for the lender than if it loaned money to a post-startup (and more secure) business. The VDF cash is often used for working capital or for buying equipment (a capital expense).

A prepared quote from Nasuni CFO and COO Scott Dussault claimed Nasuni is in a strong position: “We could, if we wanted, achieve cash flow break-even next year, but given the intense demand for our solution, we’ve chosen to pursue growth and invest in all aspects of our business, including further international expansion in 2017.”

Businesses wanting file data protected, secured, shared and managed in the cloud, whether private, public or hybrid, are now faced with product/service choices from five types of vendors who all want their business:

  1. Public cloud providers - like Amazon, Google and Microsoft
  2. File sync’ and sharers - like Box, Dropbox, Egnyte and Syncplicity
  3. Secondary storage silo convergers - like Cohesity and Rubrik
  4. Cloud storage gateways - like Avere, CTERA, Nasuni and Panzura
  5. End-point backup companies extending their services - like Druva

Nasuni is aiming at bigger enterprises, and claims it has large, well-known companies from a wide variety of sectors, including Ecolab (a water, hygiene and energy technologies and services company), one of the world’s largest video game developers and publishers, and one of the world’s largest advertising agencies amongst its customer roster. It aims to survive the coming five-way supplier shootout that way. ®

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