Cloudera’s current 2015 valuation tops $5 Billion, with estimated revenues of $199 million. Cloudera makes data software products and data management software.

  • Current Valuation 2016 – $5 Billion
  • Revenue Estimate 2015 – $199 Million
  • Industry: Data, Software
  • Founded: 2008

In its website, Apache Hadoop-based software provider and data management company Cloudera promises unified and secure solutions for storing and protecting data. It also lists some of its biggest partners. Over the years, the company has had quite an interesting and exciting journey, especially regarding funding and investments.

ClouderaFounded in 2008 by creative thinkers from Google, Oracle, Facebook, and Yahoo, Cloudera has grown significantly to a family of bright minds that number to over 1,000. It may not be as big as a multinational corporation, but Cloudera is making waves because of its commitment to excellence. The kind of data management service it offers has given the company several awards from prestigious industry watchdogs.

The Hadoop big data software provider is known for being aggressive in its quest for funding. Since its inception, it has attained annual revenues that exceed the $100 million mark. Additionally, the funding it has received over the years has totaled to over $1 billion. Its number one competitor is Hortonworks.

Cloudera has customers and partners from practically every sector. One of the probable reasons for this is the fact that it is an open source platform, which sits well with a lot of people and organizations. It is also backed by an efficient and energetic management team led by its CEO, Tom Reilly.

The People Behind Cloudera

Reilly, a University of California, Berkeley Bachelor of Science graduate, has an impressive career portfolio. He was HP’s vice president and general manager of enterprise security before joining Cloudera. His past affiliations include ArcSight, where he was the CEO; IBM, as business information services vice president; and Trigo Technologies Inc, where he also served as CEO.

Cloudera’s Chief Strategy Officer is one of the company’s co-founders, Mike Olson. Aside from his stint as vice president for Oracle Corporation’s Embedded Technologies, he was also the CEO of an open source embedded database engine called Sleepycat Software. Olson also held positions in several tech companies like Informix Software, Britton Lee, and Illustra Information Technologies. This University of California, Berkeley computer science graduate is Cloudera’s main man for anything related to product strategy, among other things.

Joining Reilly and Olson are Chief Finance Officer Jim Frankola, who has more than 25 years finance and financial leadership experience under his belt; Chief Technology Officer Amr Awadallah, Ph.D., another one of Cloudera’s founding partners; Chief Architect Doug Cutting, who previously held the position of Chairman of the Board at Apache Software Foundation; and Harvard University Mathematics graduate and Cloudera co-founder Jeff Hammerbacher (he is the company’s Chief Scientist who used to be on Facebook’s data team).

Other management team members are Daniel Sturman, Ph.D. (VP of Engineering), David Middler (Chief Legal Office), Senior VP of Field Operations Vishal Rao, Charles Zedlewski (VP, Products), Paul Beduhn (VP, Field Customer Enablement), Alan Saldich (VP, Marketing), VP of Business and Corporate Development Tim Stevens, and Human Resources VP Britt Sellin.

Funding and Investors

The past two years have been exciting and newsworthy ones for Cloudera as it went through several significant rounds of funding. In March 2014, for example, the company increased its equity to $900 million after technology innovation company Intel put in an astounding investment worth $740 million, which was equivalent to a $4.1 billion stake.

Apart from Intel, a $160 million funding courtesy of T. Rowe Price also came Cloudera’s way at that time. Other investors that joined the company’s private funding round included MSD Capital, LP, and Google Ventures.  

According to Cloudera CFO Jim Frankola, the funding from Intel and other investors was an indication of the company’s market opportunities. One online source also said that it was a move that gave Cloudera an edge over the big fish trying to steal the market scene. In other words, the deal made Cloudera stronger.

The T. Rowe Price funding, along with those from MSD Capital and Google Ventures, was intended for Cloudera’s expansion into Asia and Europe.  T. Rowe is a global research platform while investment firm MSD Capital manages the capital of Michael Dell and is likewise dedicated to a variety of investment activities like real estate, traditional private equity activities, and publicly-traded securities.

Cloudera’s other investors include Accel Partners, a global venture capital company; Menlo Park, California-based venture capital firm Greylock Partners, entrepreneur-focused venture capital company Ignition Partners, medical technology company investor Meritech Capital Partners, and not-for-profit investment company In-Q-Tel.

Together, these investors gave funding worth $40 million in 2011, at a time when Cloudera was still considered a startup.

Intel, whose investment is one of the biggest Cloudera has ever received, is a multinational technology company that has a long list of investments. In fact, it is recognized as one of the most active investors in several industries, such as hardware, cybersecurity, the Internet of Things (IoT), wearable technology, and storage. Its investment arm is called Intel Capital.

Possible IPO

As a result of Cloudera’s aggressive funding campaign, plus its 50% control of the market, it is expected to join the IPO bandwagon. The company is actually on the list of the next big tech IPOs for this year. Some analysts, however, believe that Cloudera will continue to raise revenues in 2016 before finally going for an IPO as this will greatly contribute to their valuation.

In 2012, Cloudera’s valuation was marked at more or less $700 million. Last year, it went almost $5 billion. As previously mentioned, though, the numbers can change as the company is expected to go out and shop for more funding as the year progresses. So, an IPO may be in the future for Cloudera, but what’s not definite is when this will happen. Aside from continuing its aggressive funding campaigns, the company might also want a little more extension to all the fun they’re having as a privately owned firm.

Cloudera’s headquarters is on Page Mill Road in Palo Alto, California. It has offices in San Francisco, New York, North Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, Illinois, New Hampshire, Texas, and Washington. It also has international offices in Shanghai and Beijing, China; Japan, the United Kingdom, France, Singapore, South Korea, Australia, India, and Hungary.