By VentureWire Staff Reporters
1/18/2005

Columbia, S.C. -- Unitrends Software Corp., a data protection company formed more than 15 years ago, said that it has raised $8.1 million in Series B financing.

New investor The Aurora Funds led the round, with participation from new investors Harbert Venture Partners and ECentury Capital. The round also included previous bridge funding from existing investor Trelys Funds. The funding will be used to expand the company's sales, marketing and development efforts, and extend its reach among small-to-medium-sized businesses, said President Jacques McCormack.

Unitrends currently has 30 employees, and expects to more than double that number this year,bringing the staff to roughly 70. "There is not a single part of this company that isn't expanding,"said McCormack.

McCormack said the company began fundraising this summer and closed the round in late December. As a result of the round, Aurora General Partner Rich Brown, ECentury Principal Amit Bhargava, Harbert Managing Partner Wayne Hunter and Trelys Managing General Partner Larry Wilson will join McCormack and company founder and Chief Technical Officer Steve Schwartz on the six-member board.

Unitrends develops and markets data backup and recovery products for small to mid-sized businesses. The company's appliances are designed to enable automated, disk-to-disk backup over corporate networks and quick information recovery after emergency situations, such as disk crashes and network shutdowns.

The Columbia, S.C.-based company sells primarily through resellers, including Northrop Grumman Corp., MPC Computers LLC and Software Plus. Unitrends' customers include Furman University, Motorola Employees Credit Union and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Formed in 1989, Unitrends was profitable from its inception until 2003, when the firm raised $1 million in Series A financing. Unitrends also raised a $250,000 round of bridge financing in 2004 from Charleston Angel Partners. McCormack said that the company plans to reach cash flow positive at the end of 2005. The company does not expect to raise additional venture financing.

http://www.unitrends.com <http://www.unitrends.com/>
©2005 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All rights reserved.

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