Gear6

Startup Gear6 clinched $10 million in its first major funding round today, as the vendor prepares to bridge the performance gap between servers and storage. (See Gear6 Secures $10M.)

The round, which was led by InterWest Partners and included existing investor U.S. Venture Partners, follows two small seed rounds in 2004 and 2005. The latest cash influx brings the startup's total funding to $14.5 million. It plans to take the wraps off its first products later this year.

"We will continue to put money into R&D, but also bring marketing and sales online in a much more serious way," says Tom Shea, Gear6's CEO. He also expects to grow the vendor's 25-strong workforce over the coming year. At this stage, however, the exec is unwilling to divulge many details of the Gear6 product line.

The startup's offerings, according to the CEO, are designed to address "the widening gap" between servers and disk-based storage systems. In a nutshell, Shea believes server capabilities and CPU power are rapidly eclipsing the ability of mechanical disk drives to deliver data quickly. "Storage just can't keep up with the servers today," he says.

Gear6 intends to eliminate these bottlenecks and maintain application performance between servers and storage. Shea would not confirm whether or not Gear6's technology is hardware or software-based, saying only that "it's a solution that works transparently with the existing products and applications that are in the market."Both NetApp and Sun are already listed as partners on the Gear6 Website. The CEO told Byte and Switch that other vendors are likely to follow their lead. "As we get this rolling, any player in the storage space could be a good potential partner for us," he says.

At least one analyst is giving Gear6 the thumbs up. "The problem that they are looking at solving is real. I think that there is a demand [for this type of technology]," says John Webster, senior analyst and founder of the Data Mobility Group. "The server to storage interface is too slow for some applications."

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), video surveillance, and healthcare applications, in particular, could reap the benefits of this type of technology, according to Webster.

But like other startups, Gear6 must now make a name for itself in a busy storage market. "It's the challenge that any startup has, of being taken seriously by the user community," explains Webster, although he feels that Gear6 has enough expertise within its ranks to tackle this problem. "The people that they have got have been there, they have done it."

Founded as Engineered Intelligence by former HP exec Matt Oberdorfer back in 2002, Gear6 initially developed clustering products for the high-performance computing space before changing focus earlier this year. "We saw a larger opportunity to target mainstream commercial applications," says Gary Orenstein, Gear6's vice president of marketing, and a former Compellent exec. "We're solely focused on solving the server/storage gap."Back in January, Shea, the former CEO of digital content specialist Mirra, took over the reins of the company, although Oberdorfer still serves as CTO. Last year, Gear6 also brought in Geoff Barall, the CEO of Trusted Data and founder of BlueArc, to serve as an advisor.

Gear6 is not the only vendor looking to boost both server and storage performance. Software specialist Opsware, which focuses primarily on servers and network devices, today snapped up storage management specialist CreekPath in a clear effort to target new markets. (See Opsware Gains CreekPath and Storage Shopping Spree.)

James Rogers, Senior Editor, Byte and Switch