Nasuni raises $15M Series B for cloud gateway

NAS software Nasuni Filer connects clients securely to cloud storage from Amazon, Rackspace, others

Another week, another startup raises money for the cloud.

Cloud gateway company Nasuni announced Monday that it has closed $15 million in Series B funding led by Flybridge Capital Partners with participation from existing investors, North Bridge Venture Partners and Sigma Partners, who led the company’s Series A funding in March 2009. Investment in Nasuni now totals $23 million for the two rounds.

Chip Hazard, general partner at Flybridge, has joined Nasuni’s board.

Nasuni offers virtual network-attached storage (NAS) software called Nasuni Filer, which allows companies to manage their volume and performance directly from their own servers. Company data is stored in the cloud by third-party or private storage providers, like Amazon Web Services, Rackspace and Windows Azure.

All of the advantages of cloud computing are there. Capacity expands automatically, but customers only pay for what they use. “Snapshot file protection technology” is the enterprise version of Apple’s playfully-branded Time Machine, allowing for simple but powerful recovery of data from a specific point in the past. Security-wise, data is encrypted to and from the cloud.

The Natick, Mass.-based cloud startup has spent the last six months accumulating a few hundred customers, something that helped attract new and existing investors to the most recent second funding round.

“We spent the last year building a loyal customer base and that proved invaluable during the fundraising,” said Nasuni CEO Andres Rodriguez. “We are now working with partners to leverage our sales capability. The time for utility storage has arrived and Nasuni is rushing to help companies make the transition.”

Pricing for Nasuni is determined by adding Nasuni Filer usage ($.15/GB per month) to cloud storage charges, variable depending on the provider chosen by the client. Per month, Amazon charges $.125/GB, Rackspace charges $.15/GB and Windows Azure also charges $.15/GB. The minimum monthly charge is $300. A 14-day trial is available for interested parties.

Watch the video below for something I never thought possible--an earnestly entertaining video about cloud computing. It’s an animated overview of what Nasuni does.