INDUSTRY

Announced $60 Million Sale of SilverStorm Will Mark First Exit in Current Fund: Core Capital Partners announced today the pending sale of SilverStorm, one of its portfolio companies, to QLogic, a leading supplier of storage networking solutions, for $60 million. When the SilverStorm sale is finalized, it will mark the first exit from Core's current fund. "We see strong potential in this deal," said Will Dunbar, managing director with Core Capital Partners. "SilverStorm's Infiniband technology has proven to complement QLogic in a way that makes the combined company that much stronger in the marketplace." The first sale of Core's $200 million current fund, formed in 2004, is expected to see almost a 100 percent annualized return. Core invested in SilverStorm in January of this year, leading a $13 million round of funding that included existing investors Bay Partners and Castile Ventures and newcomer Axiom Ventures. The funding was primarily used to expand the company's product development and sales and marketing efforts. "Working with Core Capital has certainly helped position us well for this pending acquisition," said Russ Hawkins, CEO of SilverStorm. "We believe that SilverStorm has only just begun to have an impact in the market place and QLogic is the perfect fit to take our company to the next level." Core Capital invests in "disruptive technologies" that it believes will change how products and services are provided in a given industry. The Infiniband technology created by SilverStorm links lower cost data processors together to make supercomputing more accessible and cost-effective to companies in industries like oil and gas exploration and aerospace design that process high volumes of information. After the sale to the multi-billion dollar networking company, SilverStorm will continue to be based out of King-of-Prussia, Pennsylvania.