Overland expands strategic relationship with Sphere 3D

Overland Storage has announced an expanded relationship with Sphere 3D Corporation, a virtualization technology solution provider, as a result of Sphere 3D’s recently announced agreement to acquire the product portfolio of V3 Systems. Once completed, this acquisition by Sphere 3D is expected to enable incompatible devices and applications to run over the cloud. Pursuant to Overland’s existing supply agreement with Sphere 3D, Overland’s NAS platform will be included in the V3 offering, which will be delivered through Overland’s channel partners.

?Sphere 3D recently announced a definitive agreement to acquire V3 Systems, Inc., of Salt Lake City Utah. V3 is the creator of the Desktop Cloud Orchestrator™ virtualization software, which is designed to allow administrators to manage local, cloud hosted and hybrid virtual desktop deployments, as well as a series of purpose-built, compact, efficient and easy-to-manage servers, known as V3 Appliances. As an Embedded OEM VMware partner, V3 has revolutionized the speed, ease of deployment and even the size of the data center required for virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI).?

According to International Data Corporation (IDC), "The rapidly changing virtualization landscape continues to have a significant impact on storage systems. In 2010, 41.8% of external storage systems’ capacity was attached to virtualized environments. IDC expects 2014 to be the crossover year in which more storage capacity will be shipped to virtualized environments than to non-virtualized environments - a good chunk of this capacity will be for desktop virtualization infrastructures." IDC forecasts that by 2016, storage attached to virtualized x86 workloads will be 71.1% of external storage systems capacity.

?"We expect the combination of the joint technologies of Sphere 3D and V3, along with the Overland NAS platform, to create a unique value proposition that satisfies pain points in today’s growing market. This new level of flexibility creates an opportunity to deliver new business value to our customers, including faster time to deployment, reduced complexity, increased performance, as well as cost efficiencies that go right to the bottom line," said Eric Kelly, President and CEO of Overland.?

V3, Sphere 3D, and Overland have been working closely together for several months and Overland began shipping the V3 Systems products in December 2013. In addition, pursuant to the existing agreements between Overland and Sphere 3D, the parties intend to deliver and provide support for both Sphere 3D’s existing and newly acquired V3 product suites through Overland's extensive global network of channel partners and service providers. Peter Tassiopoulos, CEO of Sphere3D, said, “I couldn’t be more excited with the blended solution we have created with Overland and V3. Overland’s massive global reach will enable us to create the market penetration velocity needed to deliver our solution through a proven and trusted partner.”

Sphere 3D’s purchase of the V3 product portfolio is subject to various closing conditions, including the completion of due diligence, financing conditions, receipt of approval of the Toronto Stock Exchange and various other conditions customary of a transaction of its nature. Sphere 3D has notified Overland that the closing is expected to occur on or about February 28, 2014.