Kumar Malavalli
Director @ VKRM Ventures
San Francisco, United States
Kumar Malavalli is a seed investor at VKRM Ventures in San Francisco focused on Software and Enterprise Software. Kumar Malavalli is the co-author and driving force behind Fibre Channel, an evolutionary technology that enabled the development of production-class storage area networks (SAN's). Co-founder and former CTO of Brocade Communications; Currently Co-founder, Chairman and CEO of InMage Systems.In February 2003, Kumar was inducted into theSilicon Valley Engineering Council Hall of Fame for his contributions to technology. He also received the Gene Milligan Award for Effective Committee Management from the International Committee for Information Technology Standards (INCITS) for chairing an INCITS committee that developed 17 standards in the area of Storage Area Networks. In 2012 the Computer History Museum published his work on Fibre Channel standards in the T11 Accredited Standards Committee.Kumar's philanthropy in the field of education extends from digital learning centers in rural India to American institutions of higher education. He has established the Kumar Malavalli Endowed Chair in Storage Systems Research at University of California Santa Cruz, co-founded the Indus Scholastic Management Services and serves as a trustee of the Indus International Schools.He currently invests in and mentors numerous startups in US, Canada and India, served as a member of the Board of Directors of The Indus Entrepreneurs Silicon Valley Chapter (TiE), and is a trustee of the American India Foundation (AIF). In 2012, Kumar became a trustee of the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco.
- Total investments:
- 8
- Last investment:
- Lead investor:
- 13%
Last updated:
For AI agents: llms.txt
Industries Kumar Malavalli invests in
Stages Kumar Malavalli invests in
Countries Kumar Malavalli invests in
Round sizes
Contacts
| Type | Contact | Validation |
|---|---|---|
| Work email | ||
| Personal email | ||
| Work phone | ||
| Personal phone | ||
| Socials |
Round size
- Seed
- $1M–$2.6M
Investment Focus
Industry
- Software 6 (75%)
- Enterprise Software 3 (38%)
- Internet 2 (25%)
- Security 2 (25%)
- Information Technology 2 (25%)
Stage
- Seed 3 (38%)
- Angel 1 (13%)
- Series A 1 (13%)
- Series C 1 (13%)
- Funding Round 1 (13%)
Country
- United States 6 (75%)
- Ireland 1 (13%)
Investments
| Company | Description | Round | Links |
|---|---|---|---|
| PowWow Mobile is redefining the mobile enterprise. Their rapid mobile app solution, SmartUX, enables organizations to simplify and extend business apps to mobile by modernizing and streamlining existing processes to deliver new and intelligent enterprise to edge experiences. The company's SmartUX Platform simplifies and extends business appsto mobile, delivering modern omnichannel experiences that empower an anytime, anywhere workforce.The SmartUX enables organizations to simplify and extend business apps to mobile by modernizing and streamlining existing processes to deliver new and intelligent “enterprise to edge” experiences. It also provides a low-code, drag, and drops environment for rapidly creating and deploying secure cross-platform mobile apps. With unmatched accessibility and ease-of-use, our solution facilitates collaboration between IT and the business, significantly reducing backlogs and accelerating time to value.Based in San Francisco, PowWow Mobile has garnered prestigious awards and recognition from AOTMP, Compass Intelligence, Gartner and more. | $2.6M / Seed / Feb 20, 2015 | ||
| C3DNA is a Silicon Valley start-up with unique technology that infuses cognition into legacy and cloud-based apps while also enabling "meta-container" functionality for Docker, OpenStack and bare metal. C3DNA’s software provides uncompromised data management and security, enables hybrid cloud capability without vendor or architecturelock-in and end-to-end service visibility and control across data centers and cloud providers. | $2M / Seed / Oct 01, 2014 | ||
| Studio POWWOW is a transmedia and Animation Production company based in Dublin, Ireland. We specialize in the creation, development and production of entertainment content solutions across multiple platforms, including mobile, web and TV. Studio POWWOW is currently in development of its first major cross platform entertainment IP ‘The World ofShipAntics.’ The World of ShipAntics is an animated comedy adventure game being developed for iOS & Android devices. We will be developing The World of ShipAntics into Appisodes, a TV series, and more. | $2.5M / Series A / Sep 24, 2014 | ||
| Wedding Party By WedPics is a one-stop-shop for every bride who cares about having the most useful and unique tools to make her big day the most personal & fun celebration of her marriage. Our content includes real planning advice from brides, cool wedding hacks & ideas to make the big day more personal, and the latest inspiration &wedding trends.We like to think of ourselves as the bride’s digital Maid of Honor, scouting the internet for the best ways the bride can simplify planning and truly set her wedding apart from the crowd. Approachable, unique, and helpful, every piece of content on the Wedding Party by WedPics is written with the bride in mind. | $1M / Seed / Feb 21, 2013 | ||
| Formerly known as SnapVolumes, CloudVolumes was founded in early 2011 by virtualization, security and datacenter luminaries from VMware, Citrix, Microsoft, Symantec, RSA, Sun (Oracle) and Virident to provide IT with new enterprise class solutions for instant-workload management that takes full advantage of virtualization, supports legacyapplications, eliminates the need for re-architecting or rewriting existing software, and works with existing policies and management solutions in datacenter and clouds by virtualizing everything above the OS. The company is headquartered in Santa Clara, California. | $2.3M / Angel / Nov 07, 2012 | ||
| InMage is a software vendor developing and delivering disk-based and scalable business application recovery solutions that allow companies to meet stringent disaster recovery requirements, eliminate the impacts of local backups, and manage application uptime to meet high availability needs. Targeting enterprises, InMage solutions provide soliddata protection for high growth data environments while eliminating backups, minimizing data loss on recovery, shortening recovery times, and increasing recovery reliability in heterogeneous environments. Their innovative, 6 patent-pending data and application recovery solutions are uniquely differentiated against the competition and as a result, we're beating the big players, gaining market share, and generating a lot of fiercely loyal customers.The company was founded in 2001 and is headquartered in Santa Clara, California. InMage Systems, Inc. has engineering operations in Hyderabad, India. | $15M / Series C / Sep 24, 2008 | ||
| InterSAN, Inc. (Scotts Valley, Calif.) is the pioneer of applications-based Storage Area Management (SAM) software that enables enterprises to fully exploit the benefits of large heterogeneous storage networks. Based on its unique Virtual Private DataPath (VPD) technology, the InterSAN solution provides improved application availability, datasecurity, and service level management. By centralizing and automating management of complex storage networking infrastructure, InterSAN's solution improves operational efficiency and business scalability for large enterprises. | $17.8M / May 13, 2002 | ||
| InterSAN, Inc. (Scotts Valley, Calif.) is the pioneer of applications-based Storage Area Management (SAM) software that enables enterprises to fully exploit the benefits of large heterogeneous storage networks. Based on its unique Virtual Private DataPath (VPD) technology, the InterSAN solution provides improved application availability, datasecurity, and service level management. By centralizing and automating management of complex storage networking infrastructure, InterSAN's solution improves operational efficiency and business scalability for large enterprises. | $7.8M / Apr 30, 2001 |
Co-Investors
About VKRM Ventures
VKRM is a boutique early stage venture capital firm committed to supporting entrepreneurs to build innovative and industry leading businesses. VKRM was founded in 2007. VKRM has invested in more than 20 companies since inception with a primary focus on investments in Enterprise Services and Software, Education and Internet sectors. They proactivelyfocus across all their core markets and aim to back the most promising companies independent of stage of business maturity. Their firm makes long-term commitments, as a growth investor, providing strategic and operational guidance to help existing management teams build world class businesses.
VKRM Ventures Contacts
| Name | Phone | Socials | |
|---|---|---|---|
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Kumar Malavalli
Director
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FAQ
What does Kumar Malavalli invest in?
Kumar Malavalli invests primarily in Software, Enterprise Software and Internet startups, most often at Seed and Angel stage. Most of the 8 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.
What is Kumar Malavalli's check size?
Kumar Malavalli typically joins rounds of $1M–$2.6M at Seed. These ranges are 10th–90th percentile round sizes calculated from confirmed public funding rounds, so they are a realistic guide to the rounds Kumar Malavalli participates in.
How do I contact Kumar Malavalli?
Public channels for Kumar Malavalli include LinkedIn, X (Twitter) and the website linked on this profile. For a verified work email and phone number, create a free Shizune account — contact data is searched across 20+ sources and validated before delivery, so your outreach lands in the right inbox.
When did Kumar Malavalli last invest?
The most recent investment recorded for Kumar Malavalli closed in Feb 2015. Shizune tracks 8 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.
Is Shizune's investor data accurate?
Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Aug 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.
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