Pica8, the leader in open systems for software defined networking (SDN), today announced that it has received $12.5 million in Series B funding from a group of investors led by VantagePoint Capital Partners, Cross Head and Pacific Venture Partners (PVP), bringing its total funding to date to over $20 million. The funding will help Pica8 to support its accelerated software development and ongoing go-to-market strategies to help continue its momentum within the emerging software defined networking (SDN) market.

VantagePoint, an early investor in Pica8, looks for companies that seek to change the status quo through the application of new technology, such as Tesla Motors and BrightSource Energy. 'We believe software defined networking will soon be the new standard for enterprise operations,' said Patricia Splinter, Chief Operating Officer and Managing Director at VantagePoint. 'Pica8 is on its way to becoming a leading supplier of SDN technology because it has the right team, unique technology and deep market understanding to make the most of this significant transition.'

To support significant revenue traction in Japan, Cross Head provides business investment, training and system integration expertise. And to ensure Pica8 has a strategic foothold in the manufacturing powerhouse of Taiwan, the Taipei, Taiwan-based Pacific Venture Partners provides industry knowledge, technical expertise, operating experience, financial strategies and global resources to help young, innovative ventures grow into world-class companies.

'Investors and the market alike clearly recognize the value of migrating from traditional networking to SDN,' says James Liao, CEO and co-founder of Pica8. 'Through their respective investments, we're excited that Vantage Point Capital Partners, Mitsui and PVP have validated our belief that this market potential is strong and that Pica8 is moving toward establishing a clear beachhead that will lead to continuing customer adoption.'

About Pica8, Inc.

Pica8 pioneered open networking with PicOS™, the first network operating system that enables customers to easily migrate from conventional networking to software-defined networking (SDN) using commodity bare metal switches. PicOS provides extensive support for traditional switching and routing protocols and delivers SDN solutions through Pica8's adoption of Open-vSwitch (OVS). Pica8 can provide PicOS, switching hardware or both in a fully integrated package as part of an end-to-end data center SDN solution, and makes adopting SDN easy with a Starter Kit that enables deployment in hours rather than months. Pica8 is a global company headquartered in Palo Alto, California. For more information, visit www.pica8.com or follow @pica8 on Twitter.