ACADEMIA

Three-Year Growth of 43% Propels DDN Onto 29th Annual List

DataDirect Networks (DDN) is included in the 2010 Inc. 5000, an exclusive ranking of the nation's fastest-growing private companies. DDN placed 3702 out of 5000 companies ranked by percentage growth over the past three years. The company ranked 275 out of only 501 companies on the list with more than $100M in revenue, and fourth among seven computer hardware vendors.

It was also the only enterprise storage vendor on the entire 5,000 company list, which during its 29 years of publication by Inc. has included nearly every major corporation to emerge in the United States during that time.

"Our inclusion as the only storage provider in the Inc. 5000 is a testament to our continued delivery of solutions on the cutting edge of the technology industry," said Alex Bouzari, CEO and co-founder, DataDirect Networks. "The explosive growth of videos, photos, 3-D modeling, and other types of unstructured content, coupled with the advancement of supercomputing requires new, powerful solutions to store, distribute, and manage data -- the old solutions were built for a very different world. 10 years ago DDN foresaw this shift in the market and is now preparing for a significant expansion for the next 10 years."

The 2010 Inc. 5000 is ranked according to percentage revenue growth when comparing 2006 to 2009. To qualify, companies must have been founded and generating revenue by June 30, 2006. Additionally, they had to be based in the United States, privately held, for profit, and independent -- not subsidiaries or divisions of other companies -- as of December 31, 2009. The minimum revenue required for 2009 is $2 million.

Since 1998, DDN has built technology that makes it possible to store and access revolutionary amounts of unstructured information -- enabling organizations worldwide to achieve breakthrough progress in every field of endeavor. The company's customers include 7 of the world's 10 fastest supercomputers (according to Top500.org), whose scientific achievements are changing the world every day; and more than 500 rich media organizations, whose push into 3-D animation, new special effects, and high-definition programming are radically changing the entertainment world. The company's customers also include organizations active in 3-D modeling, video surveillance, life sciences research, and other bandwidth-intensive applications.

"We are very pleased to be included on this prestigious list," said Bouzari. "DDN is uniquely positioned on the cusp of a new era in computing -- an era measured in petabytes, in which people will demand that innovation is no longer limited by their ability to store and manage information. DDN has the technology to meet this demand, and we believe we're only at the beginning of our growth."