Skyfire Expands Global Reach with $8M in New Capital While Adding New Senior Executives

By Kerry Doyle
Contributing Writer

Skyfire (News - Alert) uses the power of cloud computing and its own technology infrastructure to offer high-speed support and delivery formats for the current massive increase in data requests. Mobile video demand is expected to rise steeply over the next three years and the proliferation of tablets and smartphones is driving video demand on mobile networks.

What isn’t as obvious, however, is that capacity demand is also expanding. There is not only an increase in the number of requests, but the higher definition (HD) of device displays is also increasing the amount of data being requested. The company’s latest $8M in Series C financing should ensure further global expansion, increased infrastructure capacity as well as the ability to add world-class executive talent.

Working in tandem with supporters Verizon (News - Alert), premier established venture capital firm Matrix Partners, early-stage investments pioneer Trinity Ventures and venture capital firm Lightspeed Ventures, Skyfire will apply its new capital across several areas. Most importantly, it will use the funding to support network expansion capacity for its customers as well as to meet the growing demand for unparalleled world-wide infrastructure support. As part of its global vision, Skyfire has recently launched Rocket Optimizer 2.0, its carrier-grade network video and data optimization platform.

Among its diverse features, Rocket 2.0 offers broad support for standard and new video formats (i.e. MP 4), enables smoother streaming and fast application to cell towers or backhaul regions once congestion is detected. Skyfire’s cloud computing infrastructure enables the Rocket 2.0 solution to be highly cost effective to scale on both 3G and 4G LTE (News - Alert) Networks. According to Jeff Glueck, CEO of Skyfire, “Skyfire’s Rocket Optimizer product is delivering an average of 60 percent savings for operators on video bandwidth.”

The new funding also enables the company to attract top-tier executive prospects. As part of the company’s growing global reach, Skyfire announced John Rintoul as the new vice president for sales in the European market. Rintoul previously held executive sales positions with Cisco, Starent Networks (News - Alert), Juniper Networks, and Kagoor Networks. Skyfire also named Scott Boehmer as vice president of sales for the Americas. Boehmer previously was vice president of sales for SEVEN (News - Alert) networks, and a product executive at Sprint. For Skyfire, its core focus is on making sure the customer has the best quality experience they can have by doing many different things well. Its new funding will not only add to its global position, but help to generate incremental revenue across the organization.

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