Brocade Ships More Gigabit Speed Switch Ports Than Any Other Supplier in the Industry
Business Wire - December 01, 1997 11:58
SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 1, 1997--
Dell'Oro Group Survey Confirms Brocade's Market Leadership As The
Company Raises More Than $21 Million in Venture Capital Funding in
Preparation For High Growth in 1998
Fibre Channel industry leader Brocade Communications Systems Inc. Monday announced that it has completed its last round of venture capital funding, raising more than $21 million in preparation for rapid growth in the coming year.
Brocade's quarterly revenue rate grew from $200,000 in Q1 to approximately $6.5 million in Q4 during its 1997 fiscal year, which ended Oct. 31. Reaffirming Brocade's expected growth, a Dell'Oro Group survey of the leading gigabit speed switch companies identified Brocade as shipping the highest number of gigabit speed switch ports in the industry at 4,700 ports through Sept. 30. In addition, Brocade projects it will ship 12,000-15,000 gigabit ports by the end of the calendar year.
"Generally, Brocade does not compare itself to Gigabit Ethernet companies, since the two technologies, Fibre Channel and Gigabit Ethernet, are complementary, not competitive," said Brenda Christensen, vice president of marketing for Brocade. "However, it's important for the market to see how quickly all gigabit technologies are being implemented, and that the purchasing of Fibre Channel Fabric solutions is occurring at a remarkably quick pace. Brocade is an excellent example of the industry's fast growth and has raised these funds to further enhance our ability to serve our customers through 1998."
Investor Information
Funding was completed through lead investor Weiss, Peck & Greer Venture Partners, with additional funding from Norwest Venture Capital and Imperial Bank, as well as several of Brocade's current investors which include:
-- Bay Partners
-- Crosspoint Venture Partners
-- JAFCO America Ventures Inc.
-- Mohr, Davidow Ventures
-- LSI Logic
-- Andreas Bechtolsheim
Brocade, the first company to market with a cascadable gigabit speed Fibre Channel switch, the SilkWorm, plans to leverage the additional capital to accelerate development of new products and features, to expand production and test capabilities, and to increase working capital to support its high growth environment.
In addition, Brocade will use the funds to expand its sales, customer support and integration areas. With Brocade's SilkWorm switch currently in the top 15-20 OEM's evaluation or qualification cycles, the company plans to launch its VAR and integrator channel programs in 1998. Brocade has also made a serious investment to implement its Partners Program, which will serve to provide the industry with a selection of tested interoperable product choices when implementing a SilkWorm Fabric. Brocade's Partners Program, the first of its kind in the Fibre Channel industry, addresses the needs of integrators and end-users, providing them not just with a switch, but with a completely tested Fabric solution.
"This additional funding provides us with a solid foundation to support rapid growth throughout 1998, and further establishes Brocade as the dominant market leader in Fibre Channel switching," said Bruce Bergman, president and CEO for Brocade.
Weiss, Peck & Greer Venture Partners Director Christopher J. Schaepe stated, "We have tracked Brocade's progress since 1996, and have been impressed by the performance of the company's experienced management team in delivering leadership products. Brocade has established a reputation as a high quality Fibre Channel supplier based on core strengths in product development and customer support, providing a foundation for the establishment of a multi-hundred million dollar business over the next several years. We are pleased to have been selected to lead Brocade's expansion financing as we believe the company has upside potential comparable to our most successful communications industry investments."
Brocade, incorporated in 1995, has quadrupled its number of employees in the past year to its current roster of more than 90. In particular, the company has expanded its sales and marketing teams, adding sales offices in Southern California (Irvine) and in Nashua, N.H.
About Brocade's Switch, the SilkWorm
The SilkWorm (announced and shipping since March, 1997) is a modular 2- to 16-port Fibre Channel gigabit switch that was designed to build scalable and resilient Fibre Channel Fabrics -- the intelligent infrastructure required to create a scalable network of enterprise servers and data storage.
The SilkWorm offers ease of configurability and manageability, and with the industry's lowest switch latency of less than two microseconds, addresses system-storage I/O bottlenecks at an affordable entry price-point.
About Brocade Communications Systems Inc.
Brocade's primary focus is to help customers build gigabit Fibre Channel fabrics, enabling them to optimize connections between data storage and enterprise servers, and to design high-performance, scalable data center backbones. Brocade has headquarters at 1901 Guadalupe Parkway, San Jose, CA, 95131. For more information about Brocade, check out the company's World Wide Web site at brocadecomm.com , or contact Brenda Christensen, vice president, marketing at 408/487-8123 or via E-mail at info@brocadecomm.com. |
