Hop aboard the Nimble spaceship

Contact: Scott Denne

From basically a standing start just two years ago, Nimble Storage is on track to put up an astonishing $100m in sales this year. That’s a faster growth rate than we’ve seen at any of the other storage companies that have come public in recent years. The hybrid flash storage vendor recorded $50m in revenue in the first half of 2013 – almost as much as it did in all of 2012.

Nimble also claimed the title of fastest-growing storage company in at least a decade, growing faster than even Data Domain did in its early days – as have several of the latest generation of storage startups, such as Pure Storage and Nutanix. Thanks to the filing, we know that the crown belongs to Nimble, at least for now. Revenue for the year ending January 31, 2013, its third year of sales, nearly tripled to $54m, and was ahead of the $46m Data Domain posted during its third year.

Storage companies’ annual revenue leading to IPO

Company Year 1 Year 2 Year 3
Nimble Storage $2m $14m $51m
3PAR $24m $38m $66m
Data Domain $1m $8m $46m
EqualLogic $10m $30m $68m
Isilon $1m $8m $21m