WSO2 raises $10M for enterprise middleware

The company gets support from Toba Capital, Cisco, and Intel Capital

After a raucous weekend of Superbowl parties and lots of beer, I’m sure you—like me—thought: Let’s start the week off with some enterprise software news. (For as much as I make fun of it, enterprise software will always have a special place in my heart…)

Enterprise middleware provider WSO2 announced Monday that it has raised $10 million in a round of funding led by Toba Capital, with help from Cisco and Intel Capital. In addition to the new capital, WSO2 announced that it has hired TIBCO co-founder John Mathon as VP of product marketing.

WSO2—which is the combination of “Web services” and the scientific symbol for oxygen—raised the new capital after a year of “incredible growth” in 2012. New customer bookings were up 220% in 2012, and CEO Sanjiva Weerawarana says that the average deal size has “grown significantly.”

The company has won over a number of large clients as the only complete open source enterprise SOA middleware stack built as an integrated platform. Clients are Global 1000 enterprises and government organizations who are building their own applications.

“We give them a comprehensive platform of pre-integrated middleware products that let them take advantage of the Web and cloud computing to rapidly create these applications,” said Weerawarana.

One such client—eBay—went on record a couple of years ago to say that it’s now processing one billion transactions per day using WSO2’s middleware.

“This gives you a sense of the scale that our software is designed to handle,” said Weerawarana, adding that the company sees the highest interest from such industries as manufacturing, high-tech, telecommunications, and financial services. 

Along with eBay, clients include Fidelity Investments, Expedia, Thompson Reuters, AAA, Kaiser Permanente, British Airways, and more.

Weerawarana says WSO2 plans to use the new capital from this round to expand its global operations, particularly marketing, sales, and support teams in the U.S. and Europe.

“In the coming months, we’ll also be rolling out next-generation middleware solutions that harness the cloud and mobile computing. We’re already seeing exciting new business models emerge from some of our Global 1000 customers who have been working with prototypes of these solutions.”

Weerawarana says the WSO2 team expects to see another 200% plus in growth over the next year.

“WSO2 has an exciting team of proven entrepreneurs, who are delivering real value to large brands that demand an agile solution for their mission-critical applications,” said Vincent C. Smith, managing director of Toba Capital.