Intel to Lead $100 Million Investment into Mirantis
August 24 2015 - 12:50AM
Dow Jones News
Intel Corp. is stepping up its support for free software
designed to help companies achieve the kinds of benefits offered by
cloud services from Amazon Inc., Google Inc. or Microsoft Corp.
The big chip maker on Monday plans to announce its lead role in
a $100 million infusion into Mirantis Inc., which sells a
subscription version of the open-source software OpenStack. Intel,
whose venture-capital arm first invested in Mirantis in 2013, is
contributing, along with other investors, to a $75 million funding
round. The company also is committing additional money to finance
future technology development by the Silicon Valley startup.
Like many other open-source products, OpenStack is available in
free and commercial versions in an arrangement that helps customers
avoid being locked into one vendor. The program, often described as
a data-center operating system, offers a software dashboard to help
companies manage collections of server systems, storage devices and
networking equipment.
The software, which competes with offerings from Microsoft and
VMware Inc., has been making slow progress since it was introduced
in 2010 by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and
Rackspace Hosting Inc., a provider of cloud computing services.
Intel's new commitment, while not decisive, could help make the
product more appealing to corporate users.
Mirantis, based in Mountain View, Calif., boasts customers
including AT&T Inc., Samsung Electronics Co., PayPal Holdings
Inc., Gap Inc. and Ericsson AB.
Intel, whose chips power most servers, has long worked with
software makers to develop products that could help spur sales of
its own technology. Last month, the company pledged to make a
series of investments under an initiative called Cloud for All to
help corporate data centers emulate the efficiency of cloud
services like Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure.
Diane Bryant, a senior vice president spearheading Intel's
initiative, has argued that more companies would set up cloud-style
operations if software developers tackled technical shortcomings
with existing products. Intel expects Mirantis to help modify
OpenStack to minimize service outages.
"There are targeted things that we want to see Mirantis go do,"
said Jonathan Donaldson, an Intel vice president who is general
manager for software-defined infrastructure.
The collaboration bears similarities to a deal announced in 2014
between Intel and Cloudera, a prominent supplier of an open-source
program called Hadoop that helps companies collect and analyze
large amounts of data. Intel invested $740 million in that
transaction.
Mirantis, founded in 2000, originally provided a variety of
technology services and in 2011 branched into cloud computing, said
Alex Freedland, the company's co-founder and president. Its
workforce has grown from 150 to 750 employees, Mr. Freedland
said.
Beyond Intel, investors in the latest funding round include
Ericsson, the venture-capital arm of software maker SAP SE, August
Capital and Insight Venture Partners. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. is
investing in the startup for the first time, Mirantis said. The
latest round comes less than a year after Mirantis raised $100
million in a funding round led by August and Insight.
Mirantis, which has raised about $220 million to date, hasn't
disclosed its valuation. Mr. Freedland said it is more interested
in demonstrating to potential customers that it has the financial
resources to compete with larger companies in the enterprise
software market.
"That is why it is important—to signal to the world that we are
here to stay," Mr. Freedland said.
Write to Don Clark at don.clark@wsj.com
Subscribe to WSJ: http://online.wsj.com?mod=djnwires
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
August 24, 2015 00:35 ET (04:35 GMT)
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