EqualLogic Receives $20 Million in Expansion Capital; Focus Ventures Leads EqualLogic's Third Round to Finance Further Growth

Business Wire, June 28, 2004

NASHUA, N.H. -- EqualLogic(R), Inc., a leading provider of iSCSI-based, self-managing networked storage solutions, today announced that it received an additional $20 million in an oversubscribed third round of funding led by new investor Focus Ventures. The Series C round, which also includes current investors Charles River Ventures, Sigma Partners and TD Capital Technology Ventures, supports EqualLogic's expansion of sales, marketing and manufacturing activities in North America, Europe and Asia. With this most recent round of funding, EqualLogic now has raised a total of $52 million in equity capital.

In the first year of shipping its innovative, all inclusive storage area network (SAN) solution, the PeerStorage(TM) Array 100E, EqualLogic has captured over 100 customers, establishing itself as a leading provider of pure-iSCSI SAN solutions in the fastest growing segment of the storage industry - the mid-range consolidation of direct attached storage into more efficient SANs (see related release, "EqualLogic Surpasses 100th Customer Deployment and Achieves iSCSI Market Leadership"). iSCSI, or Internet Small Computer Systems Interface, is a new standard that enables networked storage over the ubiquitous IP protocol, allowing SANs to be built on common Ethernet networks instead of the expensive and complex Fibre Channel technology upon which most early SANs were built. Storage solutions based on iSCSI make networked storage accessible to a broader range of companies and promise to be a significant part of the $50 billion storage market.

"The demand for our self-managing SAN solution, which offers both large and medium-size businesses with a cost-effective, easy-to-use alternative to Fibre Channel storage networks, is growing exponentially every day," said Jack Boyle, president and CEO of EqualLogic. "The broad-based investor interest we found and the speed with which we closed this round validate our market opportunity. The additional capital fully funds our business plan, ensuring that we will meet current demand while aggressively growing our business worldwide."

"Focus Ventures invests in emerging market leaders who have established themselves with clear execution of their vision and validated the demand for their product with a large stable of happy customers, " said George Bischof, general partner at Focus Ventures who will take an observer seat on the EqualLogic board. "After looking at a number of players in this space, we chose EqualLogic because of the value it brings to IP storage. Beyond taking advantage of the attractive market opportunity for iSCSI-based storage solutions, EqualLogic has created a new paradigm for how SANs are built and managed, clearly giving customers what they need - self-managing and scalable pools of storage that can respond nimbly to user demands."

"EqualLogic has exceeded the board's expectations every quarter, and we are impressed with the rapid market acceptance and aggressive sales growth that this company has demonstrated in just one year of shipping the pioneering PeerStorage array," said Michael Brown, EqualLogic board member who also serves on the boards of Quantum Corporation and Veritas Software Corporation. "This new round of funding led by a premier expansion capital firm like Focus Ventures and the enthusiastic participation of the current investors is an indication of the tremendous confidence we all have in EqualLogic's future."

EqualLogic is the only standards-compliant IP SAN solution provider to offer a comprehensive and fully integrated standard feature set at no additional cost to the customer. Each PeerStorage Array 100E supports up to 3.5 terabytes of storage capacity, comes with fully redundant fault-tolerant hardware and includes full-featured automatic storage-management software. Up to 32 arrays can be combined to form a scalable enterprise storage grid of more than 100 terabytes.

About Focus Ventures

Focus Ventures is the leading expansion stage venture capital firm that invests in emerging market leaders in the software, semiconductor and communications industries. Focus Ventures currently manages $570 million, having closed its first fund in October 1997 and Focus Ventures II in December 1999. Focus Ventures offers its portfolio companies access to high quality partners in Asia and an extensive network of resources focused specifically on driving top line revenue growth through customer introductions and by establishing distribution channels, joint ventures and licensing arrangements. Since the firm's inception, Focus Ventures has invested in 77 companies and has had 20 IPOs and seven acquisitions by public companies. A select number of portfolio companies that have gone public include: Active Software, Agile Software, Alteon WebSystems, BroadBase Software, Chordiant Software, Commerce One, Copper Mountain Networks, Corio, CoSine Communications, Interwoven, Loudcloud, Niku, Pixelworks, and Verisity. For more information on Focus Ventures, visit www.focusventures.com or call 650.325.7400.