Cloud WAN Op Startup Aryaka Confirms $15 Million Round

Aryaka, a WAN optimization and acceleration startup

According to Milpitas, Calif,-based Aryaka, all of its previous investors participated in the Series B round, including Trinity Ventures, Mohr Davidow Ventures and the round's leader, Nexus Venture Partners. Aryaka plans to use the funds to continue to build awareness of its SaaS-based WAN optimization platform, the company said.

"Series A is easy, but a lot of companies die after that, just before the Series B stage," said Ajit Gupta, founder and CEO of Aryaka, in an interview with CRN. "We feel good about this round. Now we are in this for the long haul, and we're going to spread the word."

Aryaka was founded in 2008 and claims its WAN optimization platform can offer less than 20 millisecond latency for 90 percent of the world's users of business Internet. The company uses various techniques, from proxy servers to redundancy removal, over its own private network to power its WAN optimization service, and in May, completed a rollout of 25 points of presence throughout the world.

It works with VARs, referral agents, service providers and IaaS providers and allies with other vendors, and Aryaka's nascent channel program offers revenue sharing opportunities to solution providers. Aryaka's $14 million Series A funding round was in September, and its Series B funds will go toward hiring more salespeople, raising awareness and building out Aryaka's market presence, Gupta said.

Gartner recently projected the growth of the WAN optimization market -- dominated by Riverbed Technology, Cisco and other key players -- from $700 million in 2006 to an expected $1.9 billion in 2011. Gupta believes Aryaka is on the leading edge of a trendy market veering away from hardware appliance-based solutions and toward the as-a-service delivery model.

"The market penetration for WAN optimization is only about 5 percent -- only about 300,000 boxes," said Gupta. "We want to work with people who can see the future and who we don't have to convince this is the way to sell WAN optimization."