I’ve heard a couple tidbits about Verari in the past couple days, most of which are unconfirmed. I’ve reached out to those who would know, but have not heard back. Therefore, this counts as rumor, but rumor from a reliable source. I’ll confirm what I can as I dig.
The headline word is that David Driggers was the winning bidder for Verari’s assets on January 5. His possession is evidently subject to finalization of terms with the bank (Silicon Valley Bank). Further word is that none of the majors (Cisco, Dell, others) who were expected to at least be interested in bidding showed up. No word on the amount. I’ve heard, but have not yet confirmed with Dave, that he’s interested in building back servers and blades, but not the container business.
If you do a Google search for Verari you’ll see an ad on the right side of the search screen (image at right). The ad points to advancedhpc.com, promising to take on Verari warranties for free on servers, RAID, and clusters.
I’ve also heard that one of Verari’s VP’s is now in Cisco’s employ helping setting up a container business, and that the container group is possibly being shopped around to a couple well-known companies in HPC.
Dave did put in a bid – no word on whether or not it was the winning bid.
There were several firms who wanted to talk after the new owner was in place – resellers, customers, etc. but no one showed up to put in other bids. I blame it on the CES show focus as that consumed 99% of the press from other suitors last week.
The Ad that was mentioned was from Rackable – they were offering to take on warranties of Verari’s containers – assuming (and I speculate hoping) Verari was done.
The focus is on Blades and Containers going forward.
Actually, the google adword that have been repeatedly seen have been appearing next to the insidehpc.com articles is from advancedhpc.com … a company made from parts of the now-defunct Western Scientific and at least one former Verari sales person. Also in San Diego, also able to step up and take some of the business.
SGI (that’s Rackable) supposedly has hired a senior exec from Verari “gang of 14” and a David Wright insider/buddy in particular.. so the customers who choose SGI to help them out will see at least one person they’ll potentially recollect from past transactions… SGI announced at least as far back as December 15 (noted on HPCwire), probably prior to that hire… so it must be a strategy?
A particularly credible offeror, TechForce, is supporting Verari customers also. They had a lot of Verari gear at the end apparently so this one makes a lot of sense. So they have the infrastructure and the spares to start out… It is reported that Akamai has signed up.
Wow I hope this rumor is true, Dave Driggers is a nice guy.
SGI/Rackable must be stupid. How could they hire anyone of the people that killed Verari? Not sure who they hired but I wish them well. Okay, that’s a lie. They (SGI) deserve what they get for hiring whatever criminal ex Verari management they hired.
So the “senior exec” that SGI picked up looks like Vince Scarpulla, Verari’s WW head of sales. Vince will have Americas sales at SG, according to the release: http://www.pr-inside.com/sgi-names-vincent-scarpulla-to-run-r1668637.htm.
Go Dave!
So Scrapula is ‘driving’ sales at SGI? Driving them into the ground, no doubt. Investors best short the stock.
It seems that it is true. http://verari.com/bios.asp
Hopefully he can hire back some of the old crew. It’s a bit strange that I didn’t see Victor Hestor on the list, after all he was a cofounder and VP of Operations.
Dave is a very nice guy and I hope he succeeds in bringing back his company that Wright and others drove into ground.
Yea i was wondering why the Hester crew isn’t mentioned anywhere.
From what I’m hearing C.Hester is there trying to get some of the old MMC crew back. Which is kind of a good thing, the people who worked there are good but they lacked leadership. The Super there was down right breaking every sexual harassment rule in the book and CH let it happen. But for what it is, CH will do alright for that company. If it was a bigger company with a real warehouse he would be out of his league.
You are correct; Mr. Driggers deserved better. I am sure that the “Wright Brothers” made off with whatever money was left over. Let’s see: let’s go bankrupt so we don’t have to pay anyone’s salaries, or options or insurances….and then, let’s take our money and start a new “old” company free and clear. You have to love it. And hire back one of its greatest manipulators…name not mentioned..