UPDATE — IBM Participates in Strategic Investment in Lightbend

SAN FRANCISCO, July 13, 2017 -- Lightbend — the provider of the world's leading Reactive Application development platform for building distributed applications — today announced the close of a $15 million funding round. Investors participating in the round include Bain Capital Ventures, Blue Cloud Ventures, IBM, Intel Capital, Juniper Networks and Shasta Ventures.

IBM, which is participating in the round, in June announced a strategic collaborative development initiative with Lightbend to help advance the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive solutions in the enterprise. The resulting joint solutions will be designed to provide a complete toolchain for Java and Scala developers to easily build and deploy AI and cognitive applications in both on-premise and cloud environments. The Lightbend Reactive Platform is anticipated to be available in the coming weeks through IBM’s Marketplace as an integrated bundled solution with WebSphere Application Server.

Enterprises including Credit Karma, Hootsuite, iHeartRadio, LinkedIn, Norwegian Cruise Lines, UniCredit Group, Verizon, Walmart, Weight Watchers, William Hill, and many more (see case studies) have adopted the Lightbend Reactive platform to build low latency, fast data applications based on modern microservice architectures. Lightbend’s platform and professional services have become a popular option for enterprises that leverage the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) and JVM-languages like Java and Scala – and that seek the characteristics of application resiliency and extreme scale defined by the Reactive Manifesto.

The Lightbend Reactive Platform is powered by an open source core and brings developers important capabilities across reactive programming, data streaming and microservices. IBM will integrate these capabilities across its cloud platform and portfolio of cloud services, including data analytics, cognitive and machine learning, and collaborative data science tools, which will be designed to extend new capabilities to Java and Scala communities. Developers in both enterprises and startup businesses will be able to take advantage of the latest cognitive and AI technologies and to leverage existing Websphere investments.

“This investment from IBM and the development work we’re embarking upon is a natural progression of our work to support advanced cognitive application development. As the leader in cognitive and AI, IBM brings important code and tools to our customers and the Java and Scala communities,” said Mark Brewer, President and CEO, Lightbend. “IBM’s support of Lightbend and the Reactive Platform is a validation of our shared vision for helping developers build distributed applications for the new world of cloud computing architectures.”

“The use of the Lightbend Reactive Platform is essential to building today’s modern infrastructures. Lightbend represents IBM’s continuous commitment to the Java and Scala communities. Java and Scala are the languages of cognitive and AI development, and cognitive development is the future,” said Bob Lord, Chief Digital Officer, IBM. “The collaboration between IBM and Lightbend will help enterprise developers build cognitive applications and accelerate the era of cognitive computing.”

The strategic investment includes a collaboration in which IBM and Lightbend will create new code, tools and documentation that will help developers build Java- and Scala-based applications on the Lightbend Reactive Platform. It is anticipated to integrate WebSphere and key offerings across IBM Cloud, including app management services, the Watson Data Platform and the more than 150 services across cognitive intelligence, data analytics, Internet of Things, security, DevOps, and blockchain available to developers through the IBM Cloud. IBM and Lightbend have a history of collaboration and this strategic investment will allow enterprise developers to both reap the benefits of the Lightbend Reactive Platform while integrating IBM’s leading cognitive development tools, resources and support.

About Lightbend
Lightbend (Twitter: @Lightbend) provides the leading Reactive application development platform for building distributed applications. Using microservices and fast data on a message-driven runtime, enterprise applications scale effortlessly on cloud computing architectures. Many of the most admired brands around the globe are transforming their businesses with our platform, engaging billions of users every day through software that is changing the world. For more information on Lightbend, visit: https://www.lightbend.com.

IBM Media Contact
Amanda M. Carl
IBM Corporate Communications
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Lightbend Media Contact
Lonn Johnston
Flak42
P. +1 650.219.7764
[email protected]