Verizon acquires enterprise services provider CloudSwitch

Verizon on Thursday announced it will purchase cloud services firm CloudSwitch with the intent of boosting its enterprise and IT offerings.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Verizon plans to combine CloudSwitch with the Terremark IT services company it already owns. The company hopes the CloudSwitch software, which enables enterprises to easily move applications and workloads into the cloud, will help companies move over to Terremark’s services.

Specifically, CloudSwitch currently provides an interface so customers can port applications to Amazon Web Services, Terremark and Microsoft Windows Azure’s clouds. By owning CloudSwitch and Terremark, Verizon can assure customers of better security and control between CloudSwitch and Terremark. In theory, this could help peel some enterprise customers away from Amazon and Microsoft.

“The cloud market is a rapidly growing opportunity, with very real benefits both for our business customers and the consumers they serve,” said Bob Toohey, president of Verizon’s global enterprise unit, in a statement.

CloudSwitch previously earned $15.4 million in two funding rounds. In January, 2009, CloudSwitch raised $7.4 million in first-round funding from the likes of Atlas Ventures and Matrix Partners. The company then grabbed another $8 million in its second round in June, 2009. The company was reportedly in talks for a third round when Verizon approached it with an acquisition proposal.

Next Story: OpenFeint’s single sign-on for social games to replace Apple’s UDID?(exclusive)
Previous Story: Top 10 Steve Jobs resignation reaction?stories

Tags: Amazon Web Services, cloud services, enterprise services, Microsoft Windows Azure

Companies: Amazon, CloudSwitch, Microsoft, Terremark, Verizon

View the original article here

Druva raises $12M for protecting enterprise data

Druva, a startup that protects data on enterprise laptops, said today it has raised $12 million in a second round of funding.

The Mountain View, Calif.-based company makes Enterprise inSync software to back up data on enterprise laptops, smartphones or tablets. It can also retrieve data as needed. Intel recently said that the cost of a lost laptop with unprotected data is $49,000.

Druva’s backups are more efficient than a standard backup because the company “de-duplicates” data, where it saves only a single copy of data duplicated across users. That makes backups 10 times faster and allows them to save 90 percent bandwidth and storage. Druva can store its data on a company’s premises or in the cloud, or web-connected data centers.

The round was led by Nexus Venture Partners, and existing investor Sequoia Capital also contributed. The funding will be used to expand both products and sales and marketing in several regions. Jaspreet Singh, co-founder and chief executive of Druva, will also become chairman. Other board members include Shailendra Singh, managing director, Sequoia Capital; Jishnu Bhattacharjee, principal, Nexus Venture Partners; Ramani Kothandaraman, co-founder and chief operating officer of Druva; and Yoram Novick, CEO and founder of Topio.

Druva was founded in 2007 and it has more than 750 customers. It protects 300,000 laptops and other devices. Druva has 90 employees and competes with EMC Avamar, Symantec, and Iron Mountain (now Autonomy). It has raised $17 million to date. The name Druva comes from Sanskrit and means “North Star.”

Next Story: Reddit begins the holiday shopping season early, acquires?Redditgifts.com
Previous Story: Logitech launches two cool goodies for work and play on an?iPad

Tags: enterprise laptop backup

Companies: Druva

People: Jaspreet Singh

View the original article here

Joyent Node.js expert talks about Node in the enterprise and more

Developers these days are fascinated by Node, as we recently reaffirmed with a blockbuster post on how LinkedIn used Node to make its new mobile apps.

Our written interview with LinkedIn’s mobile development chief did so well that we thought we’d record a video interview with a true Node expert: Tom Hughes-Croucher, a Joyent employee who’s writing an upcoming O’Reilly book on getting started with Node.

Joyent employs several Node-focused employees, including Node.js creator Ryan Dahl. The company, said Hughes-Croucher, is sponsoring the development of this open-source technology, and it’s providing enterprise-level support for the companies that want to integrate it with a robust safety net.

In the interview, we talk about Node in the enterprise, Node’s performance benefits, where Node falls flat and a great deal more. The one thing we didn’t get time to talk about is Hughes-Croucher’s book, so be sure to pre-order your copy. You can also peruse preview chapters online free of charge.

On another note, you may notice that we’ve been doing a bit more video posting lately. Being in the heart of the Bay Area, we’ve got access to tons of great developers, web designers, UX folks, entrepreneurs, investors and more; and we’re doing our best to wrangle them into the VentureBeat studio on a regular basis. What kinds of people should we be interviewing next? Who would you most like to hear from? Give us some suggestions in the comments, and thanks for watching.

Check out DevBeat, VentureBeat’s brand new channel specifically for developers. The channel will break relevant news and provide insightful commentary aimed to assist developers. DevBeat is sponsored by the Intel AppUp developer program.

Next Story: Amazon buys 12 new domains related to cloud?video
Previous Story: Report: webOS ran twice as fast on an iPad 2 than on the?TouchPad

Tags: node, node.js

Companies: joyent

People: tom hughes-croucher

View the original article here

Joyent Node.js expert talks about Node in the enterprise and more

Developers these days are fascinated by Node, as we recently reaffirmed with a blockbuster post on how LinkedIn used Node to make its new mobile apps.

Our written interview with LinkedIn’s mobile development chief did so well that we thought we’d record a video interview with a true Node expert: Tom Hughes-Croucher, a Joyent employee who’s writing an upcoming O’Reilly book on getting started with Node.

Joyent employs several Node-focused employees, including Node.js creator Ryan Dahl. The company, said Hughes-Croucher, is sponsoring the development of this open-source technology, and it’s providing enterprise-level support for the companies that want to integrate it with a robust safety net.

In the interview, we talk about Node in the enterprise, Node’s performance benefits, where Node falls flat and a great deal more. The one thing we didn’t get time to talk about is Hughes-Croucher’s book, so be sure to pre-order your copy. You can also peruse preview chapters online free of charge.

On another note, you may notice that we’ve been doing a bit more video posting lately. Being in the heart of the Bay Area, we’ve got access to tons of great developers, web designers, UX folks, entrepreneurs, investors and more; and we’re doing our best to wrangle them into the VentureBeat studio on a regular basis. What kinds of people should we be interviewing next? Who would you most like to hear from? Give us some suggestions in the comments, and thanks for watching.

Check out DevBeat, VentureBeat’s brand new channel specifically for developers. The channel will break relevant news and provide insightful commentary aimed to assist developers. DevBeat is sponsored by the Intel AppUp developer program.

Next Story: Amazon buys 12 new domains related to cloud?video
Previous Story: Report: webOS ran twice as fast on an iPad 2 than on the?TouchPad

Tags: node, node.js

Companies: joyent

People: tom hughes-croucher

View the original article here