ClearCube rakes in the money

ClearCube, a maker of bladed PCs, this week is expected to announce that it has received an additional $25 million in investments. The company says it plans to use the funds to expand its international marketing efforts.   The investment will bring ClearCube’s total funding to $85 million.   “We have three primary verticals – hospitals, financial and government/military,” says Carl Boisvert, newly appointed CEO of ClearCube. “This round will allow us to penetrate more verticals and markets in parts of the world where we have customers but no office. We may also use the funding to expand into manufacturing, transportation and hospitality.”   ClearCube has other funding from Paladin Homeland Security Fund, Austin Ventures, Sternhill Partners, Wall Street Ventures, Techno Venture Management, SAIC, Austin Ventures, Sternhill Partners and GIC.   ClearCube competes in the desktop blade market with HP, which recently introduced bladed desktop computers.

ClearCube, a maker of bladed PCs, this week is expected to announce that it has received an additional $25 million in investments. The company says it plans to use the funds to expand its international marketing efforts. 

The investment will bring ClearCube’s total funding to $85 million.

“We have three primary verticals – hospitals, financial and government/military,” says Carl Boisvert, newly appointed CEO of ClearCube. “This round will allow us to penetrate more verticals and markets in parts of the world where we have customers but no office. We may also use the funding to expand into manufacturing, transportation and hospitality.”

ClearCube has other funding from Paladin Homeland Security Fund, Austin Ventures, Sternhill Partners, Wall Street Ventures, Techno Venture Management, SAIC, Austin Ventures, Sternhill Partners and GIC.

ClearCube competes in the desktop blade market with HP, which recently introduced bladed desktop computers.

“We are very happy that HP is jumping [into the market where we have] our fourth-generation product,” says Boisvert. “It is a pleasure to see HP validate our space and also our value proposition,” he says. 

Boisvert claims that customers using ClearCube’s technology have a clear manageability and performance advantage over HP’s desktop blades. HP’s has a 1-GHz Transmeta based processor blade that runs over Ethernet only.

ClearCube’s bladed PC system places a keyboard, mouse and a device called a user port on the user’s desktop. The CPU for the system, which is located in the data center, connects to the user port via Ethernet or a fiber-optic connection.

ClearCube has several User Port options including the C/Port, Fiber C/Port, Multi-Video eXpander and I/Port. The C/Port connects the keyboard, video and mouse to the CPU blade over Category 5 cable up to 200 meters long. The I/Port lets users connect to their blades over a standard Ethernet connection. With the blades located in a rack in the data center, management is eased. Network administrators simply need to connect the user to a new blade if a failure occurs.

The company numbers Morgan Stanley, Hill Air Force Base and heating and ventilation equipment vendor Trane, among its customers.