Container Storage Developer MayaData Gets $26M Infusion From DataCore, Others

DataCore is investing money and an engineering team to help MayaData build out its storage container technology for Kubernetes, and the two will work together to bring the offering to the market.

Software-defined storage technology developer DataCore, along with its private equity owner Insight Partners, took part in a $26 million equity investment in MayaData, a developer of container-attached storage for Kubernetes.

The investment, which gives DataCore and Insight Partners a minority stake in MayaData, includes transferring a team of DataCore container-focused engineers to become MayaData employees, the companies said.

The investment also brings the two into a tight partnership under which DataCore will bring MayaData's container storage technology to its channel partners and customers, said Evan Powell, CEO of Palo Alto, Calif.-based MayaData.

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Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.-based DataCore is providing both funding and an 11-person engineering team to MayaData, Powell told CRN.

"The funding is great," he said. "Appreciated. But we are also stepping up. We're getting a great technology team, and a great channel."

Gerardo Dada, DataCore chief marketing officer, told CRN that, according to a DataCore study to be released shortly, 23 percent of storage professionals are not prioritizing investment in containers this year.

"We used our own expertise and technology to develop container technology," Dada said. "But we realized that, to be successful, we needed significant resources. So we have this joint venture with MayaData. We're transferring engineers and our technology to them."

Powell said the two companies have a mutual IT licensing agreement under which DataCore intellectual property is being transferred to or licensed to MayaData.

"We can build DataCore intellectual property into MayaData-based products," he said. "And DataCore will build MayaData intellectual property into their products. Our typical customers are Kubernetes teams who typically don't sell storage and who don't call themselves a storage business."

DataCore approaches the Kubernetes container business in two ways, Dada said. Customers of the company's software-defined storage SANsymphony block-focused and vFilO file and object storage technologies have CSI (Container Storage Interface) plug-ins for Kubernetes.

But for customers focused on devops and who are designing container-based storage systems and who typically need thousands of connections in a second, DataCore will help them work with MayaData.

"We will point our resellers to MayaData for Kubernetes," he said. "If the customer is cloud-native, we will refer them to MayaData."

Evans said that, while the two companies' technologies complement each other, it is too early to talk about acquisitions.

"It's not something we're talking about today," he said. "We're looking first and foremost at providing for our customers. If we do this well, anything can happen. If we don't, we won't deserve this conversation."