Fusion-io, a US company whose Flash memory-based technology is designed to accelerate data storage systems, is preparing to launch on a public stock exchange.
The company, which counts IBM, Hewlett-Packard and Dell among its resellers, has told regulators it expects to raise in the region of $150 million from its initial public offering (IPO), according to Reuters.
Founded in 2006, the company announced last month that it shipped more that 15 petabytes-worth solid-state storage systems in 2010. “It is increasingly clear that server-side flash has moved past the bleeding edge and is making its way into the mainstream of enterprise computing,” IDC analyst Benjamin Woo said at the time.
Fusion-io appointed Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak as its chief scientist in 2009. The company “is in the right place at the right time with the right technology and ready to direct the history of technology into the 21st century and beyond,” he said at the time. “The technology marketplace has not seen such capacity for innovation and radical transformation since the mainframe computer was replaced by the home computer.”
The news may be taken as an indication that market conditions are more conducive to IPOs than they have been in that least two or three years. A number of technology companies have delayed stock market launches durin that time, citing unfavourable market conditions.
