by Angela Guess
Derrick Harris commented on Opera’s recent success in raising $84 million in its first-ever funding round. According to Harris, “That amount shouldn’t be surprising for anyone familiar with the company.” He writes, “Opera has been flying under the radar, but it hasn’t exactly been struggling. Opera CEO Arnab Gupta told me in May that the company was already doing $100 million a year in revenue, growing fast since launching in 2004. It was able to grow so fast because of the inherent value of big data analytics and the Opera service. Gupta told me in a call this morning that he expects the company to do about $140 million next year. According to the Wall Street Journal, the funding values the company at about $500 million.”
He continues, “Opera does such good business in part because large customers such as Citicorp and Nissan don’t need much convincing that there’s value in gleaning intelligence from their data. But unlike many other big data products, Opera takes the guesswork out of the process. It helps customers determine the best strategies, and then processes and analyzes the data as a service. Customers don’t have to acquire analytics expertise, nor do they have to invest in expensive infrastructure. It’s one of a handful of companies doing big data in the cloud, which is a trend I think will catch on in a major way over the next couple of years.”
photo credit: Opera Solutions
