Initiating Coverage: IceWeb, Inc. (IWEB) Target 2013 $2.25
NBT is initiating coverage of unified storage company with our initial target of $2.25 or 10X projected 2013 sales of $45 million in their low cost/high efficiency unified data storage systems.
We will complete an in-depth report on the company and the opportunity the address shortly...but here is the condensed version of our equities research report in progress.
IceWeb, Inc. (IWEB.ob): The ONE Tech Company in the VERY Right Place and The EXACT Right Time
NBT is initiating coverage of unified storage company with our initial target of $2.25 or 10X projected 2013 sales of $45 million in their low cost/high efficiency unified data storage systems. This target implies more than 10X upside from the current price per share of .15.
Why so bullish on IceWeb? Because in the context of the three gigantic $TRILLION Megatrends in Enterprise IT
- The move to public and private cloud computing and data center based desktop and mobile applications
- The transformative power of BIG Data Analytics and what it means to ALL companies
- The creation of 100 PETABYTES (1024 terabytes) of data to be stored and analyzed EVERY DAY
IceWeb is perfectly positioned with a low cost/high efficiency unified data storage solution in the commoditized unstructured data storage market.
Literally, if we could dream up the perfect technology stock for 2012 and the foreseeable future it would be:
- A Direct Beneficiary of the 2 Most MASSIVE Mega Trends in The IT World: Cloud Computing/Storage and Big Data Analytics
- Be the low cost solution to the biggest problem associated with Cloud Computing and Data Analytics: MASSIVE Daily Creation and Storage of Unstructured Data
- Benefit from the Federal Government’s $100 Billion MANDATE to “Move Government IT To the Cloud by 2015”
- Be virtually invisible to Wall Street and technology investors
- Be RIGHT In the Middle of the MONSTER $20 Billion Feeding Frenzy of Acquisitions of Storage Solution Companies from the Monster IT Giants: EMC, IBM, HP, DELL and NetApp
- Be RIGHT In the Middle of the MONSTER Enterprise IPO’s Coming To Market
The fact that IceWeb the public company is SO far off Wall Street’s technology stock radar made our discovery of its data storage solution all the more profitable.
The fact that there is feeding frenzy of buy-outs in this space makes Ice Web and its lowest cost/highest performance open source storage software/hardware solution makes IceWeb a PRIME take out play—in our mind the only question is WHEN not IF.
Why?
Behold the story of $20 BILLION in unstructured data storage hardware and software M&A in the last 12-18 months.
|
Price |
Revenues |
Multiple |
Dell |
04/05/12 |
Make Technologies |
Application modernization software |
|
|
|
04/03/12 |
Clerity Solutions |
Legacy system
re-hosting solutions |
|
|
|
04/02/12 |
Wyse Technology |
Thin Client computing |
|
|
|
03/13/12 |
SonicWALL |
IT Security |
|
|
|
02/24/12 |
AppAssure |
Backup and Recovery |
|
|
|
08/26/11 |
Force10 Networks |
Storage Networking |
|
|
|
02/22/11 |
Compellent |
Enterprise class storage |
960,000,000 |
147,000,000 |
6.53 |
11/05/07 |
Equallogic |
Enterprise class storage |
1,400,000,000 |
70,000,000 |
20.00 |
Hewlett-Packard (HP) |
09/27/10 |
3Par |
Thin Client |
2,350,000,000 |
217,044,000 |
10.83 |
10/01/08 |
Lefthand Networks |
Data storage |
360,000,000 |
50,000,000 |
7.2 |
NetApp |
06/16/05 |
DeCru |
Storage security/Data encryption |
272,000,000 |
|
|
03/09/11 |
Engenio |
External storage systems |
480,000,000 |
|
|
EMC |
11/15/10 |
Isilon |
Storage infrastructure for cloud/Big Data |
2,250,000,000 |
184,249,333 |
12.21 |
05/10/12 |
Xtreme IO |
|
430,000,000 |
0 |
Infinity |
07/20/09 |
Data Domain |
Backup and Archive |
2,100,000,000 |
263,302,000 |
7.98 |
The storage technology feeding frenzy is as staggering as it is real. But why the orgy of acquisitions by Tech Titans in data storage land?
Cloud Computing and Big Data Analytics.
It is the daily creation of hundreds of PETABYTES (a petabyte is one quadrillion bytes, or 1024 terabytes) of data coming from cloud computing and big data analytics that is driving the IceWeb opportunity. NONE of this data creation was around 10 years ago...and only the recently has the explosion in social media, video streaming, cloud based enterprise and mobile applications and now mobile tablet & smart phone penetration above 50% of North America/Europe/Japan users combined into the perfect storm of petabytes of data created every DAY from the 1.5 billion users of the Internet.
So how big IS a Petabyte of data in understandable terms?
- 1 Petabyte is 20 MILLION Four Drawer Filing Cabinets FILLED with Text
- 1 Petabyte is 13.3 YEARS of HD-TV Video
- 1.5 Petabytes is the 10 BILLION Photos on Facebook
- 20 Petabytes is the ENTIRE Hard Drive Space Manufactured in 1995
- 50 Petabytes is the entire written works on mankind from the beginning of recorded history in ALL Languages and Countries
Everyday Google is creating 20 petabytes of unstructured data...Facebook creates similar amounts with 300 million photos and tens of millions of video’s posted every day.
Now consider the move to the FREE cloud storage deals for 1.5 billion internet users...the massive enterprise cloud computing services from Amazon (and now Microsoft and Google announcing their own competing enterprise cloud computing services last week).
We also expect an IPO frenzy POST FACEBOOK for enterprise software and cloud computing companies. Workday, Inc. will probably be the biggest among a pending batch of enterprise-oriented IPOs set for summer and fall. Then there is Violin Memory Inc. Reuters is reporting that cloud storage and collaboration concern Box.net, Inc. is looking like it's eyeing an IPO in 2013. The bankers are going to be busy now that the Facebook frenzy is over.
All the trends for FREE and paid cloud based data storage is driving the tsunami of demand for unstructured data solutions.
|
FREE Storage Limit
(In Gigabytes) |
|
5 gigabytes |
|
2 gigabytes |
|
5 gigabytes |
|
5 gigabytes |
|
7 gigabytes |
|
5 gigabytes |
|
5 gigabytes |
The IceWeb Open Source Unified Data Solution.
What is the big deal about unified unstructured data storage?
In a 2009 report, the IT consulting firm ESG says of unified storage, “It is interesting to stop and ponder how we ever created a world without it.” Buying, maintaining, and managing separate storage systems for file and block data results in incredibly costly and inefficient. A unified storage system – a single system supporting both data types – significantly reduces complexity and cost of data storage at the same time demand for unstructured data storage is exploding.
It’s really that simple. The company with the highest unified storage efficiency at the lowest $dollar per petabyte wins. And right now IceWeb is bringing exactly that formula to data centers around the world.
It took them a while to get it right...and they were EARLY into the market (which cost them a lot of money and made them issue a LOT of shares—150 million)...but they are now a 10 year overnight success.
Why? Because the IceWEB Storage System is a high-performance, unified storage system that offers one platform for file and block data of all kinds at the lowest cost per petabyte. Whether it’s Microsoft Exchange, SQL Server or Oracle databases, virtualized environments, scanned images, files, video, pictures, graphics, or voice data, IceWEB maximizes the efficiency of all data storage by centralizing all data on one platform secured with strong data protection capabilities.
The IceWEB Storage System is easy to install and provides built-in, all-inclusive storage management features including de-duplication; unlimited snapshots; thin provisioning; local or remote, real-time or scheduled replication; capacity and utilization reporting, and integration with virtual server environments.
All their functionality comes at one of the lowest cost/capacity solutions available. The storage software is open source Unix—think of IceWeb as the Red Hat of data storage systems—they did not INVENT the open source Unix storage software—they just keep improving it.
In addition, ALL IceWeb storage capacity scales with disk shelves rather than expensive controllers.
IceWEB’s Unified Data Storage solution was recently named “Best in Class” for replication in the DCIG 2012 Midrange Array Buyer’s Guide, the IceSTORM OS on IceWEB Unified Storage Appliances supports asynchronous replication, and supports all four types of snapshots (AoW, CoW, Full Copy and Split Mirror) providing a truly flexible and low storage solution for the cloud. |
IceWEB IceSTORM OS |
Replication Software Licensing Included on all IceWEB Unified Storage Appliances
By including the replication software with all IceWEB Storage Appliances, organizations are free to use IceWEB’s replication software as they see fit, enabling them to use replication for their cloud storage approaches in ways they might not have otherwise anticipated if bound by separate licensing structures.
Supports Unlimited Snapshots
IceWEB’s snapshot feature can theoretically support the creation of an unlimited number of snapshots, thus reducing the recover y point objective (RPO) and recovery time objective (RTO) both locally and in the cloud.
Flexible Snapshot Capabilities
Closely tied to IceWEB’s ability to scale to an unlimited number of snapshots is the flexibility that IceSTORM OS gives organizations to manage snapshots and then utilize them once they are created. Using the IceSTORM OS organizations may:
- Create snapshots based upon a preset schedule
- Manually initiate a snapshot at any time
- Create a consistency group by identifying a group of volumes associated with a particular host or application and then initiating a snapshot across of all those volumes simultaneously
- Read from the snapshot to do a backup or perform a search to comply with an eDiscovery request
- Convert an existing snapshot from read-only to read/write or create a read/write snapshot so the data on the snapshot may be read from and written to during testing and development
Replication across All IceWEB Unified Storage Appliances
What ultimately makes IceWEB’s Unified Storage Appliances affordable and practical for cloud storage approaches is that organizations may use its asynchronous replication software to replicate data between any IceWEB Unified Storage Appliance.
Replication for Business Continuity, Disaster Recovery and High Availability
Having asynchronous replication natively available on IceWEB Unified Storage Appliances opens the door for organizations to explore business continuity, disaster recovery, high availability and even new data protection options that were typically beyond their means.
By continuously replicating data over a TCP/IP network using IceWEB’s asynchronous replication option, organizations may create a near real-time copy of the volume or volumes from another IceWEB Unified Storage Appliance.
Once data is replicated to a second system, multiple use cases emerge for how it may then be used. The replication found on the IceWEB Unified Storage Appliances also facilitates the introduction of application high availability. The need for applications to be “always-on” grows daily and even “minor” application.
- Take snapshots of replicated data. As can be done on the primary system, snapshots may also be done on the second system to be used for archives, backups, eDiscovery searches, litigation holds, or sources for recoveries. However taking snapshots at a second site eliminates the need to backup snapshots and move them offsite.
- Do regularly scheduled business continuity and disaster recovery testing. Getting the data recovered and in place prior to doing a DR test tends to be the most time consuming component of doing a DR test. Using replication, the data is in place so organizations are prepared to schedule and do DR tests or even initiate a full recovery should the need arise.
- Positions them to do recoveries in the “cloud.” The clock is ticking as to when organizations are going to stop replicating data to their own secondary site and start replicating data to the “cloud.”
Using IceWEB’s cloud storage appliances, organizations can begin to explore the possibility of placing an IceWEB Unified Storage Appliance with a cloud provider and replicating data to that cloud provider. This eliminates the need for the organization to have a dedicated secondary site and minimizes its cost to implement a viable DR plan.
Summary
IceWeb provides the cheapest storage box and more important the lowest cost/highest performance solution to public and private enterprise cloud data storage centers and to the FREE cloud data storage companies. The list of buyers includes big telco cloud players like Verizon...AT&T...and big internal private clouds like AOL, The Federal Government, Fortune 1000 companies and thousands of small-to-mid sized businesses (the SMB market).
Their unstructured storage solution was named “Best In Class” by numerous independent IT consulting firms in 2011 and 2012. In addition the IceWeb solution is right in the middle of the 10 Biggest Tech Trends of 2012:
- Private Clouds
- Virtualization
- Social Business
- Mobile Computing
- Storage Trends
- Advanced Business Analytics
- The Personalized Web
- Video-enabled Business Processes
- Service Oriented Architecture
- Sustainability and IT
Bottom-line...with the new distribution deals IceWeb has recently put in place...with the new deal they have with one of the hottest cloud technology companies on the planet Fusion-IO, with new deals coming with ALL the major petabyte-a-day storage creators and private datacenters (the Amazons, Facebooks, AOLs, Verizons of the world) Ice Web is almost magically in the right place with the exactly right product at the right time.
And let’s not forget the Federal Government’s MANDATE to close over 700 of their datacenters and move ALL government IT to...the cloud. That is a $100 billion mandate over the next few years—Democrat or Republican in the White House.
What’s IceWeb worth when it gets to $50 million in sales? $100 million in revenues? We will have much more for you on IceWeb, Inc. in a later report with revenue forecast and valuation, but I wanted you to get a HEAD START on acquiring shares UNDER .25 before all the fundamental news hits the tape about IWEB.
Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good...I’ll take lucky and a few hundred thousand shares of IWEB any day.
PS—Here is their website and complete solution story.
Download the report here.
About the Author
Founder and Editor-in-Chief NBTEquitiesResearch.com. Contributor and Anchor Fox News Channel and Fox Business Network. Chairman & CEO NBT Group,Inc., a boutique private capital investment bank and investor relations organization.
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