Graylog, Inc., the company behind the popular Graylog open source log analysis platform, today announced that it has raised a $2.5M round of financing to accelerate product development and expand its commercial capabilities. Graylog will provide services and support to make it even easier for organizations to deploy Graylog in production, and to continue offering an affordable alternative to expensive machine data analysis platforms such as Splunk.

The round was led by the Mercury Fund, with participation from Crosslink Capital, Draper Associates and High-Tech Grunderfonds. The company also announced that Aziz Gilani, Partner of the Mercury Fund, has joined the company's board of directors.

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According to Gartner, Inc. 'By 2017 approximately 15 percent of enterprises will actively use IT operations analytics (ITOA) technologies to provide insight into both business execution and IT operations, up from fewer than 5 percent today¦ As investment in ITOA technologies continues to grow, so too is interest in extending capabilities beyond their intended IT operations management use cases and data.1'

'Machine data is growing at an exponential rate within IT departments, yet the cost of deriving operational intelligence from logs has been prohibitive. Graylog was created as an open source platform to make big data analytics affordable so that more organizations can realize the benefits of collecting, storing, and analyzing log data to improve operational efficiency, security, and reduce the cost of IT,' said Michael Sklar, CEO of Graylog. 'This funding will enable us to accelerate development, drive market adoption, and improve the value users get from the Graylog open source platform.'

'Innovation in IT operations analytics is being held back by pricing constraints and a lack of competition,' said Aziz Gilani, Partner of the Mercury Fund. 'Graylog is in a position to disrupt this market with a big data platform that is enterprise-ready and has budget friendly pricing that encourages experimentation. We expect to see an explosion of new use cases since organizations of any size will be able to affordably apply analytics to a wider range of challenges.'

About Graylog

Graylog provides service and support for the open source Graylog solution which stores, searches, and analyzes machine data collected from IT infrastructures and applications. The company enables organizations, at a fraction of the cost, to improve IT operations efficiency, security, and reduce the cost of IT. Graylog has received funding from the Mercury Fund and is based in Houston, Texas. For more information visit: www.graylog.com

About Mercury Fund

Mercury Fund is a seed and early-stage venture capital firm that invests in compelling and novel software and science-based startup opportunities. With over $225 million under management, Mercury partners with extraordinary entrepreneurs to build globally competitive businesses, focusing on technology innovation originating in the U.S. Midcontinent. Since inception in 2005, Mercury Fund has become one of the most active venture firms in the middle of the U.S., becoming a 'go-to' fund for entrepreneurs at the earliest stages of idea generation, company formation, and market execution.