The company has been managed throughout by its Board of Directors. Initially this was just Dr Rudgyard as Managing Director and Dr Williams representing the University. Dr Williams resigned in 2003, and the company now has a non-executive Chairman, Dr Rudgyard as Managing Director and four other Directors, all of whom are also full time employees of the company. The current board is a mix of academics and commercially strong and mature individuals.
The company has progressed very well, with annual turnover growing as follows:
Year ending Feb 2001 £55,000
Year ending Feb 2002 £796,000
Year ending Feb 2003 £2,266,000
Year ending Feb 2004 £3,069,000
The forecast for the current year is £4,800,000, a further 56% growth. It now employs about 30 staff, and has moved offices four times within the University of Warwick Science Park buildings. The company is now considering a further fundraising or floating on the London Stock Exchange AIM market.
What helped/hindered the company in its development
The main factors helping the company were:
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Assistance from Warwick Ventures, the technology transfer arm of the University. This included “ghost writing” the business plan, introductions to venture capitalists, a very small amount of funding, and temporary loan of some office space.
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A flexible approach from the University more generally, which included easy approvals processes, and release of Dr Rudgyard from some of his duties. The University has been well rewarded, in that its share stake is now worth at least £700,000.
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Early stage funding from the Mercia Fund was crucial. The Mercia Fund is one of the UK University Challenge Funds, which are dedicated to funding early stage spin-off companies with up to £250,000 of equity and loan funding. The Mercia Fund invested in Streamline at a time when hardly any other investors would have considered it, and have been rewarded with a three-fold increase in the value of their shares.
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Suitable accommodation on short-term flexible leases from the University of Warwick Science Park.
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Government grants (such as the Smart Award*) and tax relief (as R&D tax credits) have been helpful, though not crucial.
*The Smart Award is DTI (Dept of trade and industry). Again, known by Warwick Ventures, and well known in the UK for TT offices, etc.
No notable factors have hindered the company.
Track Record
Their reputation has its roots in the UK academic and research sectors, where their understanding of the technology and ability to meet exacting requirements led to contracts with a wide range of institutions and organisations. As the designer and supplier of many of Europe's largest cluster computing solutions, Streamline Computing is not simply supplying the technology – they are leading it.
Increasingly, organizations are recognizing the cost/performance benefits of cluster and grid computing. By talking to Streamline, clients benefit from their insight into the most appropriate way of using clustering technology to achieve significantly higher performance for a lower or equivalent cost than the supercomputer alternative.
Aademic customers include the universities of Aston, Bath, Birmingham, Cambridge, Durham, Essex, Exeter, Hull, Imperial, Kent, Lancaster, Leicester, Leeds, Liverpool, Loughborough, Newcastle, Nottingham, Oxford, Portsmouth, QMW, Salford, St Andrews, Surrey, Sussex, University College London, Warwick and York, the Open University, the Medical Reseach Council and the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory.
Commercial customers include Astex Technologies, ChevronTexaco, Corus, Cosworth Technology, Fujitsu, McLaren Formula One, OHM Surveys, Organon Research, Qinetiq, Rolls Royce, Schlumberger Geoquest, Serco Assurance, Tularik and UK AEA.
Streamline has installed the most powerful Linux and Solaris clusters in the UK, five of which are in the top 500 list. Their experience includes a 256 processor AMD Opteron Myrinet cluster, and numerous 256+ processor Intel Myrinet systems, 176 and 128 processor Ultrasparc III/Myrinet systems. They have also delivered heterogeneous clusters using Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet and Myrinet.
Streamline's own software products are in use at academic, governmental and commercial sites in Europe, the US and Asia; they are also contributing research to academic projects in the UK.
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