I am excited to share that Naya Ventures was the lead investor in the US$ 8.5 MM Series A investment in Seattle based Cloud Management Platform company CoreStack (www.corestack.io). Naya Ventures has been investing in enterprise focused cloud technology companies. We were particularly pleased with the value that CoreStack was delivering to enterprises pursuing Digital Transformation Strategies. Cloud and Digital Transformation are inseparable. CoreStack is uniquely placed in the Cloud Value Chain, the TCO/ROI benefits that CoreStack brings to enterprises, the AI/ML based autonomous character of CoreStack platform and the founding teams expertise in building foundational technology for Microsoft Azure were one among the several factors that influenced Naya Ventures to invest in CoreStack.

Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services are the core of cloud computing architectures for enterprises pursuing digital transformation strategies. Google and IBM are following suit to gain enterprise mindshare. However, as pioneers both Microsoft and Amazon have been benefitting the most as enterprises pursue a multi-cloud architecture. Multi-cloud architectures present challenging problems and the response to these problems starts with an ombudsman aka Cloud Management Platform, one of the fastest growing cloud market segments with an addressable market of US$ 32 BB by 2021 offering CoreStack an abundance of opportunities. We are excited for CoreStack as they have built a cutting and bleeding edge Autonomous Cloud Management Platform ready for prime time use by enterprises.

I was earlier referring to the challenges multi-cloud architectures present for enterprises. The challenges include optimizing costs, ensuring compliance and adhering to governance standards like GDPR, FedRAMP, California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) Etc. Cloud Management Platforms helps enterprises to ensure ongoing compliance to meet the governance and regulatory standards. A study by Object Management Group has revealed that good governance is measurable, and studies show that organizations with above average IT governance have over 20% higher profits than those with inadequate governance. CoreStack’s has a visionary approach to addressing the challenges with their 4Cs approach: Cost, Compliance, Cloud Operations, and Consumption that has won them recognition from industry leading analyst firms including Gartner which featured CoreStack as a ‘Cool Vendor’ in its report titled ‘Cool Vendors in Cloud Computing’ published on 11 October 2019. CoreStack is one of the only four vendors from the cloud computing space named in this coveted report from Gartner. 

Naya is keen to invest in companies with management teams with domain expertise. CoreStack has a seasoned management team led by industry veterans with deep domain expertise in enterprise software, IT infrastructure and managed services with most of leadership team having worked at Mindtree, that was responsible for the infrastructure development of Microsoft Azure. This expertise in Microsoft Azure has given CoreStack an edge over their competition with a Cloud Management Platform that is ready for mission critical use by enterprises.

Naya Ventures is excited to lead the Series A funding of US $8.5 million for CoreStack along with a prominent Silicon Valley based VC firm. Naya Ventures believes the CoreStack team is on the verge of accomplishing a unique position in this blooming new Cloud Management Platform market. The CoreStack leadership team has an extensive history of working with each other and has invested their time and own money into their platform development and operations. CoreStack has already built momentum and gained traction with a 3x growth in its last financial year. CoreStack leadership team has been further strengthened in recent months with the addition of a Chief Revenue Officer and a Chief Marketing Officer with strong experience of participating in numerous growth companies including unicorns and have had successful exits of their own.

Naya Ventures mantra has been “Leading by Collaboration” and is looking forward to providing hands-on guidance to its portfolio companies to create value for portfolio companies as well as to Naya’s investors. Naya’s proven engagement model of Invest, Engage, Collaborate, Grow and Exit with its portfolio companies has had numerous successful results (Altia Systems acquired by GN Audio/Jabra, Hyperverge, Amplif.ai etc.). Naya aids in areas of strategy, business development, hiring, product strategy, follow-on funding, networking and strategic transactions. In that spirit Naya already enabled CoreStack to license its platform to the world’s largest commercial real estate service in the world.

We at Naya Ventures are excited to have CoreStack as part of our family and wish them great success