NetApp acquired Akorri Networks to add performance-and-capacity analytics for virtualized data centers to its OnCommand management portfolio. The transaction, announced on January 12, 2011, closed on January 31, 2011. NetApp described it as an approximately $60 million all-cash deal; its audited filing recorded a total purchase price of $62.3 million.
What Akorri Networks did
Akorri was a privately held data-center management software company headquartered in Littleton, Massachusetts. Founded in 2005, it focused on performance-capacity analytics for virtualized, shared IT environments.
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Its software helped customers identify performance bottlenecks and plan storage capacity. It analyzed visibility across applications, servers, networks and storage, giving IT teams a broader view of how shared infrastructure was performing than storage monitoring alone. NetApp’s announcement described Akorri’s role and product focus in its January 12, 2011 announcement.
Why NetApp wanted Akorri
The acquisition extended NetApp’s OnCommand management software suite with analytics spanning the wider virtualized IT stack. NetApp’s strategic case was that customers could better analyze and automate shared infrastructure, improve service-level delivery and adapt to changing business requirements by combining storage management with Akorri’s performance and capacity insights.
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NetApp also pointed to the companies’ market positioning: Gartner placed Akorri in the Visionaries quadrant and NetApp in the Leaders quadrant for Storage Resource Management and SAN Management Software. This was positioning cited in NetApp’s announcements, not a claim that Akorri itself was a storage hardware provider.
Customer momentum
NetApp reported that Akorri grew its customer base by more than 100% in 2010. That figure was reported by NetApp in its February 1, 2011 completion announcement; it is a historical company-reported result, not an independently stated growth measure.
When the deal was announced and closed
- Announced: January 12, 2011.
- Closed: January 31, 2011. NetApp announced completion on February 1, 2011, and its SEC filing says Akorri’s results were included from January 31, 2011.
How much NetApp paid
NetApp’s completion announcement characterized the purchase as an all-cash transaction worth approximately $60 million. Its fiscal 2011 audited filing reported a total purchase price of $62.3 million for 100% of Akorri. The figures differ in precision: the public announcement gave an approximate deal value, while the filing reported the accounting purchase price.
The filing’s accounting allocation included $22.0 million of identified intangible assets, $23.3 million of goodwill and $9.9 million of deferred income taxes, along with other net assets. It also reported that $7.9 million was held in escrow to secure indemnity obligations. Those figures describe purchase accounting and transaction protections; they are not separate additions to the reported $62.3 million purchase price.
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What the acquisition meant for NetApp’s products
NetApp’s stated plan was to extend OnCommand with Akorri’s analytics and visibility across applications, servers, networks and storage. In practical terms, this addressed a management problem in virtualized environments: when workloads share infrastructure, a slowdown may arise outside the storage system, while capacity planning requires understanding demand across the environment. Akorri’s analytics were intended to help connect those performance and capacity signals.
The company announcements describe the strategic intent and product fit; they do not establish how long every Akorri capability remained available under its original name or the precise later product roadmap.
Quick Recap
Sources
- NetApp, “NetApp to Acquire Akorri Networks, Inc.” (January 12, 2011).
- NetApp, “NetApp Completes Acquisition of Akorri Networks, Inc.” (February 1, 2011).
- NetApp fiscal 2011 investor filing, acquisition table [c3].
- SEC Form 10-K, “Acquisition of Akorri Networks, Inc.” [c4].
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