Viola Private Equity Invests $7 Million in Zend Technologies

CUPERTINO, Calif. and HERZELIYA, Israel, Jan. 10, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Viola Private Equity and Zend Technologies today announced that Viola made a growth equity investment of $7 million in Zend. Viola's investment adds to the Company's previous internal round raised from its existing investors, including Greylock Partners, Index Ventures, Azure Capital Partners, Intel Capital, SAP Ventures and others, which was announced in May 2010. All together the financing round amounts to $16.5 million.

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Zend, the world's leading provider of open-source and commercial solutions for developing and managing PHP Web applications, achieved record revenue growth in 2010, signing up a high number of enterprise customers, including NYSE Euronext, General Electric and Cisco. Revenue from the Company's Web application server product line has grown extensively in 2010, as more companies chose the Zend solution for running their business-critical applications on-premise or in the cloud. With this investment, Zend is well-capitalized for the launch of new cloud offerings, partner initiatives, and expansion of its global sales force to support enterprise business growth.

Viola Private Equity is a $164 million buyout and growth capital technology fund, affiliated with the Viola Group, a private equity investment group with nearly $2 billion under management. Joining Zend's Board of Directors is Harel Beit-On, Founder and General Partner at Viola Private Equity.

"Adoption of open-source and PHP technologies is a mega-trend among both enterprises and ISVs worldwide," said Harel Beit-On, Founder and General Partner of Viola Private Equity.  "When businesses look for cost-efficient solutions to streamline the development and management of their web applications, they come to Zend. The Company continues to demonstrate its significant value-add to enterprise customers. The emergence of cloud computing is motivating companies to revisit their platform choices and we believe Zend, with the recent launch of Zend Server and the Zend Cloud Application Platform, is well-positioned to accelerate its penetration and growth in the market."

According to Andi Gutmans, CEO and co-founder of Zend, "As cloud initiatives move to the forefront of enterprise IT, Zend is well-positioned to help its customers realize the benefits of cloud computing while leveraging the power and ubiquity of PHP. Having Viola Private Equity as an investment partner with expertise to share in the management of large software companies will help Zend drive PHP innovation and community-building, and accelerate enterprise business growth."

About Viola Private Equity

Viola Private Equity is a buyout and growth capital technology fund focusing on investments in established, private or public, companies, in particular: technology companies and other companies in a growth/expansion phase with international activity. The fund invests money directly into the companies and/or acquires holdings from existing shareholders. The Fund acquires substantial holdings in companies, aiming to lead and contribute to their development and growth. Viola Private Equity is managed by four seasoned partners – Harel Beit-On, Osnat Ronen, Jonathan Kolber and Sami Totah – all of whom have extensive private equity and company building experience. Viola Private Equity is an affiliate of the Viola Group, a leading innovative private equity investment group with $2B under management, focused on technology-based investment opportunities in Israel. For more information, please visit our website: www.violape.com.

About Zend Technologies

Zend Technologies, the PHP Company, is the leading provider of software and services for developing, deploying and managing business-critical PHP applications on-premise and in the cloud. PHP runs 35 percent of the world's Web sites and has quickly become the most popular language for building dynamic Web applications. The Zend family of products includes Zend Server Web application server, Zend Studio IDE and Zend Framework. Zend is headquartered in Cupertino, California, with offices in France, Germany, Ireland, Israel and Italy. Visit www.zend.com for more information.

CONTACT:  Robin Shepherd of Zend Technologies, +1-408-778-7880, [email protected]

SOURCE Zend Technologies