<A> Diamond Lane Communications Corp. Raises $31.2 Million in D Round Investment Funding
PETALUMA, Calif.--
Blue Chip List of Investors Endorses Enormous Potential of Speedlink(TM) System in xDSL Market
A stellar list of venture capital firms and strategic corporate partners have invested $31.2 million in Diamond Lane Communications Corp., a worldwide leader in xDSL technology solutions, the corporation announced today.
The $31.2 million is more than the twice the goal set by the company for its D round of financing, according to Diamond Lane CEO Jerry Parrick.
New strategic corporate partners investing in Diamond Lane include Cabletron, NEC America and Nokia. "Our partners bring a broad range of strengths to Diamond Lane: experience with data communications equipment and software, entry into the domestic market with an established customer base, and access to international markets through worldwide distribution channels," says Parrick.
"Diamond Lane has the unique advantage of being first to market with a complete xDSL package," said Dr. Rikeo Maruta, senior vice president for NEC America, Inc. "Combined with NEC's ATM switching, SONET transport and Access systems, we offer our customers a complete solution from basic POTS to high speed Internet data and video services. We are pleased to be a strategic partner of Diamond Lane. Together we will provide our customers the finest level of products, engineering and technical support available in the market."
"Nokia is committed to the broadband future. Our cooperation with and investment in Diamond Lane, one of the most exciting and innovative forerunners in xDSL development, underlines this commitment," states Kari Suneli, senior vice president, Fixed Access Systems, Nokia Telecommunications.
"By partnering with Diamond Lane, Cabletron now has the opportunity to provide intelligent xDSL technology as part of a complete future set of carrier, telecommuting and VPN offerings," said Chris Oliver, executive vice president and Chief Technology Officer of Cabletron Systems.
"Since Diamond Lane's first funding round, investors have been increasingly bullish on DSL. We all realize that the communications world is becoming data-centric and faster access to the Internet and corporate networks will be a universal need in the 21st Century. We are very happy with the support we are receiving from our investors in our pursuit of these opportunities," says Parrick.
"We've been impressed with Diamond Lane's ability to deliver on their product commitments since we became their lead investor almost three years ago," says Jennifer Gill Roberts, general partner of Sevin Rosen Funds.
"We see Diamond Lane emerging as a DSL market leader and are pleased to have such high quality strategic partners as Cabletron, NEC and Nokia helping to drive this leading edge technology to market," says Roberts.
Significant Market Potential
"There is incredible potential for DSL worldwide, with an estimated 800 million loops. This represents a huge market for DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) technology which operates on traditional copper phone lines," Parrick says. "In just a few years, millions of PC users worldwide, with Internet connections, will be using DSL to work faster and smarter."
"This new bandwidth will exponentially improve the utility and entertainment value of software and web sites. An example is push technology. The 'always-on' feature of DSL, as evidenced in our Speedlink(TM) system, will enable market acceptance of push technology to a much greater level," Parrick says.
Blue Chip Venture Backing
Investment bankers Deutsche Morgan Grenfell (DMG) led the D funding round which consisted of 18 investors -- including DMG. The original blue chip venture capital investors also participated in the D round: Sevin Rosen, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Crosspoint Ventures Partners and Oak Investment Partners.
Since its founding in June 1995, Diamond Lane Communications has raised a total of $48.3 million in four rounds of investment funding.
Diamond Lane's first round of venture financing occurred in June 1995 with $400,000 raised from Sevin Rosen, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Crosspoint Ventures Partners and Diamond Lane founders George Hawley and Chet Stephens. The second round of $4.7 million was closed in August 1995 from the founding venture investors and GC & H Investments. The third round of $12.2 million -- from Oak Investment Partners and the original venture investors -- closed in August 1996.
Diamond Lane Communications Corp., founded in 1995, is one of the first companies in the world to commercially offer DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) data access. Privately held, the company is a worldwide technology leader in xDSL solutions, enabling a variety of high-speed data applications via its Speedlink(TM) system, a DSLAM (Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer) based on ATM standards.
Its mission is to enable network and service providers to offer today's NetSet power users, corporate telecommuters and small businesses economical, high-speed access to the Internet, as well as other data services.
For more information contact Diamond Lane Web site: dlcc.com Diamond Lane and Speedlink are trademarks of Diamond Lane Communications Corp. |
