Salesforce Helps Inject $11.7M In Odaseva, A Cloud Data Management Firm

Odaseva, which develops a cloud data management platform for mission-critical business applications, including Salesforce in particular, has closed a Series A round of funding that brought the company $11.7 million.

With the new round, which included funding from new investor Salesforce Ventures in addition to funding from two private equity firms, total funding in San Francisco-based Odaseva now totals about $14 million.

Odaseva, whose name combines "oda" from the French word "audace," or bold and daring, with "seva," a Sanskrit word meaning "selfless service," reflects the French-Cambodian ancestry of the company's CEO and founder, Sovan Bin.

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Odaseva develops a platform that protects data, provides compliance, and manages operations related to Salesforce data, Bin told CRN. The company currently has a Salesforce focus. "But the need to protect data and accelerate compliance is there across every technology," he said. "So we are preparing to expand our footprint."

However, Bin declined to discuss which business applications would be the subject of Odaseva's focus next.

Odaseva differs itself from its rivals in two ways, Bin said.

The first is in the fact that it addresses data challenges, including backing data up, ensuring it is compliant, and managing from an operations viewpoint, are done as part of a single platform, he said.

"Today there are integration platforms on which customers can develop anything related to data flows," he said. "But they require businesses have developer teams. Odaseva is plug-and-play, with no need for developers."

The second is in Odaseva's use cases related to data protection, compliance, and operations, Bin said. "Some vendors compete in specific use cases, but not on the entire platform," he said. "But a focus on the platform is important for management of data overall."

Bin told CRN that he formed Odaseva and released its first product in 2012 after he spent six years working with Salesforce in Paris, France where he saw the need to protect application data while enhancing its compliance.

The company's first customer was Schneider Electric, which had a complex Salesforce implementation. The bulk of its business since then was from Europe, but the new funding will be used in part to expand its operations in North America and the Asia Pacific region, he said. The funding will also be used to help attract new indirect sales channel partners and build programs for such partners, he said.

Bin declined to discuss Odaseva's finances, citing the company's status as a privately-held business.

Odaseva plans to remain a standalone company, and is not looking to be acquired, Bin said. "But I guess every fast-growing company could be an acquisition target," he said.