Out of the blue Komprise gets $37 million funding raise

File data management startup Komprise has raised $37 million in its first fund raiser since 2019.

Komprise’s Intelligent Data Management (IDM) product manages and monitors unstructured data estates for customers across their on-premises and public cloud environments and stores the data to the most cost-effective storage tier. The software also finds out which users access which data and in what location.

Kumar Goswami.

CEO Kumar Goswami put out a statement: “We’re thrilled that our investment partners see the opportunity we’re creating by developing a comprehensive platform for customers to modernize unstructured data management practices.”

“Komprise delivers immediate data storage cost savings and long-term business value with a foundation for unstructured data analytics and machine learning innovations.”

The cash will be uses to “to scale operations and extend market leadership” – though how it’s going to do that isn’t specified. Presumably it’s product development.

The cash raise is being presented as a growth capital round and came from Canaan Partners, Celesta Capital, Multiplier Capital and Top Tier Ventures. Kevin Sheehan, founder and managing general partner, Multiplier Capital, said: “We invested in Komprise because of their impressive growth and path to profitability combined with the massive opportunity in edge data management and unstructured data for AI/ML in the cloud. We believe in the company’s market, vision, team and execution.”

Komprise says it experienced record-setting growth and customer expansions in 2022. It grew revenues 306 percent from 2018 to 2021, with new customers in 2022 accounting for 30 percent of the total. That’s very encouraging considering the Ukraine war, supply chain issues and inflation headwinds affecting everyone. Its Net Dollar Retention is 120 percent, meaning customers tend not to leave once recruited and spend more money with Komprise.

Clearly it is not yet self-funding but the investors see a route to profitability. The increasing emphasis being paid to storage cost-efficiency and reducing power consumption plays into Komprise’s marketing tailwinds.

Komprise was started up in 2014 and has taken in a relatively small $85 million in funding, with the last round taking place in 2019 and raising $24 million. The three founders are Goswami, president and COO Krishna Subramanian, and CTO Michael Peercy.