The NetApp Excellerator Program Rocket-Fuels B2B Tech Startup Ecosystem with Cohort Five

NetApp (NASDAQ: NTAP), the leader in cloud data services, today announced the graduation of its fifth cohort as part of the NetApp Excellerator demo day. NetApp Excellerator is the company’s flagship startup accelerator program. On this occasion, five technology startups, CloudSEK, Senseforth.ai, Lightwing, Coralogix and Curl Analytics, showcased their technology impact and market opportunity to an eminent audience comprising of venture capitalists, industry leaders and the NetApp leadership team.

The program has so far mentored 29 B2B technology startups through five cohorts and has evolved to focus on a sponsored proof-of-concept (PoC) model. The PoC model gives the startups a platform to prove the potential of their solutions in the real-world. The startups and NetApp explore technology adjacencies to go to market together and help create technology that changes the world with data. All five startups are engaged in PoCs with NetApp.

The pitch presentations made by the entrepreneurs at the demo day saw innovations in the space of AI, machine learning-powered log analytics, conversational AI, intelligent automation and digital risk management. These startups have been extensively mentored to strengthen their technology solutions and product market fit while also enhancing the overall user experience. This is already creating significant business impact for their clients through solving challenges related to unstructured data, big data, customer support, reduction of cloud costs and cybersecurity.

“The fifth cohort marked the launch of an evolved model where the startups built paid PoCs, which will give them stronger go-to-market opportunities and drive exponential growth. We too have made great strides since our first cohort. Today, we are attracting new-age disruptive companies from around the world,” said Madhurima Agarwal, leader, NetApp Excellerator. “We’ve engaged deeply with 29 pioneering startups, including three who have had successful exits. This is the proof of the value NetApp has added to our alumni, enabling them to create tangible commercial success in terms of funding, customer acquisitions and successful exits.”

The program’s focus on mature startups and global outlook offers a natural fit for startups from across the world. One such example is Coralogix, an Israel-based startup which is part of this cohort.

“Working with the engineering team at NetApp is delightful,” said Lior Redlus, co-founder and CTO of Coralogix. “We found a team of professionals constantly monitoring their systems to make sure they are operating optimally, and eager to understand how Coralogix log analytics can help identify issues faster and reduce time to resolution. We learned about NetApp’s technology, and are now evaluating Cloud Volume ONTAP with the innovation team in Israel. We want to work with cutting-edge technology in the cloud.”

The strength of the program reflects in the success stories from the previous cohorts. Last year, Adya (first cohort), was acquired by Qualys, a leading provider of cloud-based security and compliance solutions. Similarly, ArchSaber, from the second cohort, and VitaCloud from the first cohort, have also had successful exits. Additionally, SigTuple, Anlyz, FirstHive and others have secured next round of funding.

“We started this program with our own unique outlook as a 27-year-old startup,” said Ravi Chhabria, managing director of NetApp India. “We continue to innovate across our ecosystem and these young startups enable our customers to change their world with data. With our deep expertise in data management we are uniquely positioned to help them navigate next-generation technologies to scale up their business. Their ability to disrupt the tech ecosystem and their vision to drive economic growth is inspiring. Our role as an accelerator is to catapult them to achieve success in delivering compelling solutions to meet customers’ needs. Most importantly, we offer them our trust and credibility, and that is the basis to build any business relationship with a young company.”

NetApp Excellerator is a mentorship-driven startup accelerator focused on creating an impact in the startup ecosystem through association with a small, yet unique set of data-driven B2B tech startups. The NetApp team, in collaboration with industry-renowned external mentors, coaches the startups on cutting-edge technologies, platforms, tools and business acumen. The participating startups get access to investors and NetApp’s customer portfolio. They also receive an equity-free grant of $15,000, or a NetApp-sponsored POC.