Tell us about how the company started and your executive team?

Founded in 2000, FalconStor Software is the premier provider of TOTALLY Open™ data protection solutions, delivering solutions that facilitate the continuous availability of business-critical data with speed, integrity and simplicity. Our executive team is lead by ReiJane Huai, whose vision has grown FalconStor into a leadership position within the data protection industry. With FalconStor, it is all about data protection that enables instant restore of data with 100 percent transactional data integrity, so businesses get back to work quickly following any data center failure.

Where did the company get its name?

FalconStor Software is named after the Lockheed Martin F-16 Fighting Falcon.

What about your experience and history before FalconStor Software?

I began my software career as a real-time assembly programmer for LucasFilm Ltd. Our group, the Droidworks, delivered the industries first non-linear editing system know as the EditDroid; this technology resurfaced later as the core technology in the Avid editing system. After leaving Lucas and the entertainment industry, I moved toward the product management side of the business and ultimately became director of advanced products for AST Research, a Fortune 1000 computer manufacturer. In the 1990s I focused on networking and business development and joined Cheyenne Software. My responsibilities grew to include OEM Sales, Product Management, Marketing and M&A, and I rose to the position of EVP corporate development. After a successful $1.2 billion sale of Cheyenne to CA, I joined Perquot Ventures as a Venture Capital Partner focused on the software industry. I have served on more than 20 technology boards both public and private and consider myself to be very fortunate in that I love what I do.

Have you experienced anything like this before in regards to the market today and where your company or technology is positioned relative to the competition?

Yes. Cheyenne rose to prominence during the rapid growth and adoption of Local Area Networking and client/server computing. Today I see a much larger and exciting trend in the move of physical computing to virtual computing and the early adoption of cloud or on-demand service architectures. We are serving a much larger and far more complex and exciting market.

What market segments are you targeting?

FalconStor works with enterprises of all sizes, from small and medium-size businesses to Fortune 100 companies to provide comprehensive data protection and storage management solutions for their data centers. It’s important to note that our solutions are horizontal in that all companies must have a data protection strategy no matter how large or small.

Is there something that comes to mind when you think about last year that you now know that you want to do this much differently this year?

One thing I have learned in business is that although you have to look back to move forward, you shouldn’t dwell on the past. Even though I was not officially with FalconStor last year, I have evaluated our business model and look forward to building upon these insights in the coming year. Falconstor is maturing as a solutions provider. I look forward to doing a better job of communicating the true value inherent in sound data protection strategies.

Is there a person or company involved with emerging technologies that you admire or are keeping an eye on?

There are far too many to mention. We are focused on technology and ideas that accelerate network performance, increase storage density, increase data integrity, simplify management, scale both up and out and ultimately reduce customer operating costs while increasing return on investment.

What do you think is holding cloud computing back from wider adoption? What issue is top-most in your mind and why?

I believe it is a matter of trust and familiarity. The IT industry routinely cycles from centralized to decentralized models. Cloud is a centralized model. The main difference is that the user may not own and control the cloud. This raises a lot of technical and legal hurdles as well as simple concerns about data security and protection. The rapid adoption of server and desktop virtualization provides a logical path to cloud computing, and the first stop will be private clouds. In time, as companies learn that they can save significant money and retain peace of mind, I think we will see a very healthy public cloud business. In the meantime, IT managers should think carefully about how their data moves into and, more importantly, out of a cloud – this is something we do extraordinarily well. Lastly, I think we all recognize the benefits of cloud computing; after all, how many of us generate our own power and drill for our own water?

For the technologist reading this, who appreciates “the deep dive”, what is it that you can you tell this person that he would really appreciate about your product?

FalconStor is lauded by analysts, partners and customers for its totally open software platform, because we work with any storage hardware, operating system, or backup software from any vendor to provide effective storage solutions. The storage management market is at a crossroads; IT managers are looking for a comprehensive data protection solution that is easy to use and covers all aspects of data protection while providing virtual solutions and rapid recovery capabilities. Rather than piecing together their disaster recovery and data backup plans with numerous options, IT managers need one comprehensive solution to take the place of these disparate systems. Also, protecting data is all about moving bits. When moving bits, you want to do it as fast and efficiently as possible and you want to make sure you don’t drop any. Our patent portfolio includes a number of key inventions that make us the best at performing this critical task.

What channels are being used to sell FalconStor Software?

FalconStor’s storage management and storage virtualization solutions are available through channel partners, OEM partners and our direct sales teams in North America, Europe and Asia.

Do you have any OEM deals now or is this being looked at?

FalconStor’s original sales models focused on OEM partnerships, from which we continue to profit to this day. FalconStor collaborates with a number of IT industry leaders to bring new solutions to market that address data protection issues and growing storage demands. In 2009, we decided to grow aggressively our non-OEM, FalconStor-branded channel sales operations, primarily via a growing channel sales network. Despite the economic downturn that started in 2008, FalconStor grew its non-OEM channel sales revenue by 15 percent in 2009.

So where does FalconStor Software go from here?

In today’s business world, data is the lifeblood of the enterprise. It must be fully protected and easily accessible at all points in time. Storage virtualization and storage management solutions will assist data centers and enterprises in capturing and managing this proliferation of data. FalconStor is committed to helping businesses by providing comprehensive data protection solutions that are simple to use while offering an elegant solution for virtualizing storage, reducing data proliferation, protecting data and rapidly recovering both physical and virtual services from failures of any kind. We are moving to deliver a holistic approach to data protection and lifecycle management. FalconStor intends to be Your Data Protection Partner.

James P. McNiel, vice president and chief strategy officer -James McNiel comes to FalconStor Software as an accomplished senior executive, bringing all of his technical and business acumen to bear on the role of chief strategy officer. Prior to joining FalconStor, McNiel was co-founder and CEO of Fifth Generation Systems, a social networking startup. Prior to that, he was a general partner at Pequot Ventures (now FirstMark Capital) for nine years, where he managed successful investments in Netegrity, NetGear, OutlookSoft and other technology companies. In addition, McNiel was a key member of the Cheyenne Software executive team that led the company to market leadership in backup software, culminating in a high-value sale to Computer Associates in 1996. McNiel started his career as a software developer and software team leader for LucasFilm Ltd. McNiel studied business and advanced management at The Wharton School and finance at MIT’s Sloan School of Management.