NetApp Excellerator hosts its demo day event

NetApp has announced the graduation of its Excellerator’s fourth cohort at a demo day event. NetApp Excellerator is the company’s flagship startup accelerator program. As part of the demo day, six technology startups – QuNu Labs, SecurelyShare, Zappy.AI, Ecolibrium Energy, Eder AI and UniQreate, showcased their business models, market opportunity and projections to an eminent panel comprising of venture capitalists, industry leaders and NetApp top executives. Innovations ranging from quantum-resistant cryptographic systems, AI-based data extraction solutions, to smart predictive maintenance systems, and RPA (Robotic Process Automation) were presented by these entrepreneurs. This batch comprised early stage as well as mature startups, including an international startup, Zappy.AI, headquartered in the U.K.

So far NetApp Excellerator, a unique corporate accelerator program with a focus on data-driven technologies, has mentored 24 such startups throughfour cohorts. The NetApp team, as well as external mentors, coach these startups on data-driven technologies, platforms, tools, business acumen, and offers access to customer and investor connects. NetApp also provided an equity-free grant of $15,000 to each of the participating startups.

With this, the NetApp Excellerator has formed eight strategic alliances through its cohorts. These include FirstHive, CardioTrack, BlobCity, SigTuple, Nanobi, Scalend and ZScore from the previous three cohorts.

The NetApp Excellerator Program alumni continue to have access to mentorship and go-to-market opportunities with NetApp. As a success story from the previous cohorts, Adya (an alumnus from the first cohort), recently got acquired by Qualys, a leading provider of cloud-based security and compliance solutions. Additionally, LightMetrics,provider of advanced video telematics (also an alumnus from the first cohort) secured a new series of funding.

Deepak Visweswaraiah, Senior Vice President and Managing Director, NetApp India comments,“We have understood some of the trends that are defining the B2B startup eco-system. Using this understanding, and our 25 years of data legacy, we are able to potentially redefine the direction of our startups. ArchSaber, a graduate from the second cohort is being acquired and this is the second company from our alumni to be acquired.The success of the NetApp Excellerator programlies in our ability towards establishing the business and technology viability of the startups within a strong B2B ecosystem.”

NetApp Excellerator has now opened registrations for its fifth cohort. Startups with interests in the areas of hybrid cloud, AI, IOT, data management and adjacent technology domains are invited to apply.