Cendura Corp raises $8m in Series B round

Cendura Corporation, a blueprint-based application management solutions provider, announced that it has closed its series B round of financing, securing $8 million.

The round was led by NeoCarta, a venture capital firm focused on early to mid-stage technology infrastructure companies in the software, hardware, networking and wireless sectors. The company has its research development centre in Hyderabad.

New Enterprise Associates, Crosslink Capital and Silicon Valley Bank, which funded Cendura's series A round, also participated in the latest round of funding. Till now Cendura has raised $16 million from the two rounds.

In related news, Peg Jackson, managing director of NeoCarta's New York office, has joined Cendura's board of directors. Peg is currently the director of DataSynapse, MediaOcean, Myrio and Silverpop, and she manages NeoCarta's investment in PRN, the country's largest entertainment and advertising network for direct retail.

"Cendura Corporation meets all fundamentals that are important today," Peg said. "Its seasoned management team has demonstrated solid market traction, and as a 'global start-up', they have achieved cost-efficiencies resulting from very successful offshoring initiatives,"she added.

Further, Cendura has built upon its ability to gather up-to-date comprehensive IT intelligence, expanding its offering into a leadership position in configuration management.

Cohesion's flexible and extensible Blueprinting platform will enable Cendura to augment its offering to become the strategic platform for all of IT, providing significant cost-savings through automation, collaboration, and improved application performance.

"We welcome NeoCarta as an investment partner, and look forward to Peg's participation in our board," said Pavan Nigam, chief executive officer of Cendura Corporation.

"This new round of funding enables Cendura to make strategic investments in sales, partner initiatives and marketing programmes. We will also increase our investment in product development, accelerating our ability to deliver on our vision of a complete strategic management platform that brings the value of Blueprinting to all levels of IT," he added.

"The proceeds of this round will be used for general corporate purposes, global expansion, and sales and marketing, including expanding the Indian operations," Lav Nigam, managing director and head of Cendura's India operations, said.

"We plan to double our strength to 140 by this year-end. We are also looking at the prospect of partnering with Tier 1 and Tier II IT companies in India who can offer our product to their customerism," he added.

"Solutions that automate the day-to-day management of the application state are becoming a de facto requirement for any company that wants to ensure the optimal performance, integrity, and availability of their advanced, distributed application environments," Mark W Perry, general partner of NEA, said.

"With this funding, Cendura will be able to cement its leadership position."

"Cendura's ROI benefits for CIOs and IT executives continue to expand from significant cost-savings derived from automation and improved productivity to lending value for such strategic initiatives as outsourcing, regulatory compliance, and disaster readiness," said Vladimir Jacimovic, managing director of Crosslink Capital. "We are very excited about their prospects for success," he added.