Pure Storage

Pure Storage
Private
Industry Data storage
Founded 2009
Headquarters Mountain View, California
Key people
 CEO: Scott Dietzen
Co-founder & CTO: John Colgrove
Co-founder & Chief Architect: John Hayes
CFO: Tim Riitters
Website www.purestorage.com

Pure Storage is a Mountain View, California-based enterprise storage company founded in 2009.[1]

Investors

In October 2009 Pure Storage raised a $5 million Series A round led by Sutter Hill Ventures. In August 2010 Pure Storage raised a $20 million, led by Greylock Partners with participation by existing investor Sutter Hill Ventures. In August 2011. Pure Storage announced an unspecified investment from the venture-capital arm of Samsung Electronics, the largest flash-memory maker. Samsung and Redpoint Ventures contributed to a $30 million Series C funding round.[2] In August 2012, Pure Storage raised $40 million in Series D funding round led by Mike Volpi's Index Ventures, along with existing investors Greylock, Redpoint and Sutter Hill, for a total of $95 million capital raised.[3] In addition to venture funding, private investors included Diane Greene, a founder and former CEO of VMware and Frank Slootman, former CEO of Data Domain.[4][5] An investment of undisclosed amount from In-Q-Tel (associated with the US Central Intelligence Agency) was announced in May 2013.[6] Another investment (round "E") of $150 million was announced in August 2013, including T. Rowe Price and Tiger Global Management.[7][8]

FlashArray

Pure Storage released a flash memory product called FlashArray on August 23, 2011.[1] Deployed in a data center, FlashArray is marketed to accelerate applications like server virtualization, desktop virtualization, database systems and cloud computing that required very high rates of random I/O operations per second.[9] InfiniBand technology is used for connecting between controllers, and Fibre Channel for connection to server computers.[10]

The second generation FlashArray, released on May 16, 2012, included new software and an enhanced data integrity fabric.[11] It was promoted with higher resiliency, encryption with zero key management, a new web user interface, command line interface, and support for VMware's vStorage interface.[12] In August 2012, Pure Storage released new software features including iSCSI connectivity using 10 Gigabit Ethernet, snapshots, and integration with VMware vCenter.[1]

Pure Storage uses multi-level cell flash memory which has higher capacity for the same price of single-level cell memory. Using software such as data compression known as data deduplication, Pure Storage markets the FlashArray to compete with traditional rotating disk arrays.[13] The company estimated FlashArray requires about 20% of the power and space required for traditional arrays.[14] Pure Storage flash memory is packaged in shelves of solid state memory devices (SSDs), from two known suppliers, sTec, Inc. and Samsung.[15]

In July 2012, Pure Storage announced a partner program for resellers.[16] Competitors include Nimbus Data, SolidFire, Whiptail, Texas Memory Systems, Violin Memory and Kaminario.[17]

Management

CEO Scott Dietzen was president and CTO Zimbra (acquired by VMware in January 2010), and former CTO of BEA Systems.[4] Co-founder and chief technical officer John Colgrove was an early engineer at Veritas Software which merged with Symantec in 2005.[18] Co-founder and chief architect John Hayes joined from Yahoo! via the acquisition of Bix. President David Hatfield, vice president of marketing Matt Kixmoeller and vice president of sales (Americas) Matt Burr previously worked at Symantec.[18] Vice president of engineering Bob Wood joined in 2011 from Omneon (acquired by Harmonic, Inc.), and previously worked at NetApp.[19]

In October 2013, EMC Corporation filed lawsuits against several former sales employees who left to join Pure Storage.[20][21]

Tim Riitters, a former Google exec, joined as chief financial officer (CFO) in August 2014.

Awards

Pure Storage was named as silver winner in the Wall Street Journal 2012 Technology Innovation Awards.[22] Pure Storage and Samsung won one of two awards for enterprise business applications at an August 2012 flash memory trade show.[23] Pure Storage was selected for the Red Herring Top 100 Americas Award in 2012.[24] Pure Storage was named one of 10 "hot emerging companies" by CRN Magazine in May 2012.[25] Pure Storage was among the top 25 best places to work in Silicon Valley, of companies with 51-101 employees by the San Francisco Business Times.[26] Pure Storage announced it was a silver winner of the Enterprise Product of the Year in Best in Biz Awards 2011.[27]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "Pure Storage Breaks Cost Barrier to Mainstream Flash Adoption With First All-Flash Enterprise Storage Array". Press Release (Pure Storage). August 23, 2011. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  2. ↑ Don Clark (August 23, 2011). "Start-Up Places Pure Bet On Flash Memory". Wall Street Journal Digits blog. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  3. ↑ "Pure Storage Receives $40M Cash Infusion to Accelerate Explosive Growth, Initiate European Expansion". Press Release (Pure Storage). August 15, 2012. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Om Malik (October 4, 2010). "Zimbra Executive Heads To Hot Storage Startup". Giga Om. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  5. ↑ "PURE Storage Raises $18.4M". Silicon Tap. August 12, 2010. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  6. ↑ "Pure Storage Picks Up New Funds From IQT". Silicon Tap. May 29, 2013. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  7. ↑ Peter Cohan (August 29, 2013). "Pure Storage Targets EMC, Streaks To IPO With $150 Million Capital Infusion". Forbes. Retrieved August 29, 2013.
  8. ↑ Quentin Hardy (August 29, 2013). "Pure Storage Goes Global". New York Times. Retrieved August 29, 2013.
  9. ↑ "Pure Storage to Present "Leveraging Flash Memory in Enterprise Storage" Tutorial at Spring 2011 Storage Networking World". Press Release (Pure Storage). April 4, 2011. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  10. ↑ Chris Mellor (August 23, 2011). "New Samsung-funded Flash disruptor uncloaks: Storage applecarts tumble like leaves in a gale". The Register. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  11. ↑ Deni Connor (May 16, 2012). "Pure Storage Rolls Out Next-Gen Storage Array". Information Week. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  12. ↑ "Pure Storage Unveils Next Generation FlashArray With High Availability, FlashCare Technology and Data Integrity Fabric". Press Release (Pure Storage). May 16, 2012. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  13. ↑ Joseph F. Kovar (May 17, 2012). "Pure Storage Releases All-Flash Array Priced More Like Disk Array". CRN Magazine. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  14. ↑ Joseph F. Kovar (August 23, 2011). "Pure Storage Exits Stealth Mode With Flash-Only Array, $55 Million In Funding". CRN Magazine. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  15. ↑ "STEC Collaborates with Pure Storage to Advance Development of the Industry’s First All-Flash Enterprise Array". Press Release (Pure Storage). October 3, 2011. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  16. ↑ "Pure Storage Unveils Channel Partner Program". Press Release (Pure Storage). July 25, 2012. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  17. ↑ Stephen Foskett (February 14, 2012). "Nimbus E-Class: The First Big, Redundant, All-Flash Enterprise Array". Grestalt IT. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 "Management Team". Company web site. Pure Storage. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  19. ↑ "Bob Wood to head engineering for Pure Storage". Press release summary (Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal). August 25, 2011. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  20. ↑ "Complaint: EMC Corporation v. Chadwick Johson" (PDF). Massachusetts: US District Court. October 18, 2013. Retrieved November 5, 2013.
  21. ↑ "EMC Corporation sues its former employees on ‘infidelity’ basis". Storage Servers blog. October 25, 2013. Retrieved November 5, 2013.
  22. ↑ Michael Totty (October 16, 2012). "Silver Pure Storage: Alternative to Disk Storage". Wall Street Journal Online. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  23. ↑ "Congratulations to the 2012 FMS Best of Show Awards Winners!". Flash Memory Summit. August 23, 2012. Archived from the original on September 15, 2012. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  24. ↑ "Americas 2012 Top 100". Red Herring Magazine. May 22, 2012. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  25. ↑ Jack McCarthy (May 22, 2012). "10 Hot Emerging Vendors for May 2012". CRN Magazine. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  26. ↑ "Best Places to Work finalists revealed". Bay Area BizTalk blog. SF Business Times. March 13, 2012. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  27. ↑ "Pure Storage Honored for Enterprise Product of the Year in Best in Biz Awards 2011". Press Release (Pure Storage). November 9, 2011. Retrieved August 12, 2013.

External links