Rubrik surfs demand for multicloud data management

Rubrik has shared some insights into the progress it made in its 2019 fiscal year, with the channel-only player continuing to increase its enterprise market business.

Given that the firm is 100% channel, then it follows that any success on the balance sheet is a direct consequence of the efforts made by its channel network in the field. For the year ended 31 January, Rubrik added more customers to the fold, achieving a customer base of more than 2,500 for its cloud data management solution, while annualised gross bookings hit a run rate of $600m.

Most of the growth was driven by demand from the enterprise customer base, which is looking at vendors such as Rubrik, with its data management background, to help navigate a multicloud environment. The firm’s anti-ransomware proposition was also popular, with the volume of threats continuing to increase, and that side of the business has remained strong.

One of the ways the firm has extended its market reach over the year is through the alliances it has struck with fellow vendors. Most recently, Rubrik integrated its cloud data management technology with NetApp and it has also has made sure that is cloud offering works with all the major players.

The other development during the year that benefited partners was the introduction of more flexible licensing, with the firm offering subscription. By the time the fiscal year ended, that method of paying for Rubrik’s applications accounted for almost half of its bookings.

“Through fiscal year 2020, we delivered new capabilities to address the priorities of enterprise customers worldwide who are moving to cloud, driving digital transformation and responding to new cyber threats,” said Bipul Sinha, co-founder and CEO of Rubrik.

The firm has also been updating its progress in gaining some blue-chip customers and now boasts a fair number of household names in its user base. “We are pleased that a number of leading Fortune 100 businesses are seeing success with Rubrik,” added Sinha.

The vendor’s UK distributor voiced its support, with Justyn Leonard, head of cloud transformation at Exclusive Networks, praising Rubrik’s approach to the channel.

“The strength of Rubrik’s performance is a result of its combination of having a disruptive proposition, coupled with an unwavering commitment to the channel,” he said. “Exclusive Networks strongly complements Rubrik as we create partner value through compelling architectures with our vendor ecosystem to accelerate customer adoption of Rubrik technology.”

Given the decent progress Rubrik has made in fiscal 2020, it is inevitable for it to be linked with a sale, but Sinha used a blog post back in October to rule that out. He wrote that he was not considering a sale and rebutted an article that had suggested a potential deal had been in the discussion stages.