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NetApp has acquired Bycast, a Canadian developer of object-based storage software for images, video and digital records.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed but NetApp (NASDAQ: NTAP) officials said it expects the acquisition to close by the end of May.
NetApp, which is battling it out with the likes of EMC (NYSE: EMC) and IBM (NYSE: IBM) in the data storage and management market, said the purchase helps round out its unified storage software strategy and gives customers an on-demand, object-based storage software option to quickly search and locate files.
Object-based storage applications, such as EMC’s Atmos offering, use metadata to automate the storage and management of data wherever it resides.
NetApp officials said the acquisition makes it possible for the company to expand its customer base to new markets including digital media, Web 2.0, healthcare and cloud service providers.
“Bycast extends our unified storage strategy and enhances our solution for shared storage infrastructure by adding new capabilities for global data access and mobility,” Manish Goel, NetApp’s executive vice president of product operations, said in a statement.
‘The addition of Bycast’s products enables NetApp to offer our enterprise customers and service provider partners a complementary solution that enables them to efficiently build and manage a very large-scale global repository of data central to many IT-as-a-service offerings,” he added.
Earlier this month, NetApp releasedfour new guides and services for customers looking for tools to help manage data in their public and private clouds.
Based in Vancouver, British Columbia, Bycast services more than 250 customers worldwide.
“We are excited and look forward to joining the NetApp team,” Bycast CEO Moe Kermani said in a statement. “We share a complementary vision and a common dedication to excellence. Together we will offer customers the best-in-class content repository solutions that further their drive toward a unified storage infrastructure.”
NetApp shares were basically unchanged following the acquisition announcement, trimming $0.02 to $18.68 a share.
Larry Barrett is a senior editor at InternetNews.com, the news service of Internet.com, the network for technology professionals.
