Caringo
Caringo is an Austin-based object storage software vendor, founded in 2005 and now a DataCore subsidiary, that sells the Swarm platform — petabyte-scale, S3-compatible, cyber-resilient storage — to enterprises for active archiving, backup, and long-term retention across healthcare, media, government, and financial services.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2005
- HeadquartersAustin, United States
- Headcount51–100
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
What Caringo does
Caringo is a privately-held storage software company founded in 2005 and headquartered in Austin, Texas, that builds object storage infrastructure for enterprise data archiving and long-term retention. Its flagship platform, Swarm, is a petabyte-scale, S3-compatible, cyber-resilient object storage system designed to hold active archives, backup targets, and compliance-grade retention data with immutability, WORM semantics, and erasure coding for ransomware defense. Caringo ships Swarm in three commercial forms: the core Swarm software for deployment on commodity hardware, a turnkey Swarm Appliance that bundles the software with hardware, and Swarm KB, a verticalized configuration targeting medical imaging / PACS archives. The company employs 51-100 people, was acquired by DataCore Software (its current parent), and historically raised roughly $20.3M in venture funding between 2008 and 2016 across multiple rounds.
The company's revenue model combines software licensing (typically per-terabyte or per-node perpetual and subscription terms) with hardware revenue from Swarm Appliance sales and recurring support/maintenance contracts. Go-to-market is primarily a direct enterprise sales motion into regulated, retention-heavy verticals — media and entertainment archives, healthcare PACS, government records, and financial compliance workloads — with indirect reach through backup-software ISV ecosystems (Veeam, Commvault and similar) that integrate against Swarm's S3 API surface. Post-acquisition by DataCore, the platform is increasingly cross-sold through DataCore's broader storage-infrastructure channel, giving Caringo access to SAN/block-storage customers seeking an object tier without hyperscaler lock-in.
Caringo's competitive position is anchored by S3 API compatibility (lower integration friction for customers and ISVs), a long engineering track record in object storage from 2005 onward, and deliberate emphasis on cyber-resilient features (immutability, WORM, erasure coding) that became commercially relevant as ransomware-driven retention became an enterprise priority. As a private subsidiary rather than a standalone venture-backed company, Caringo's financial trajectory since 2019 is not separately disclosed, and its growth is increasingly tied to DataCore's broader portfolio strategy rather than independent venture metrics.
Caringo firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Caringo
- Legal name
- Caringo, Inc.
- Website
- https://caringo.com
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2005
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 51–100 employees
- Short description
- Caringo is an Austin-based object storage software vendor, founded in 2005 and now a DataCore subsidiary, that sells the Swarm platform — petabyte-scale, S3-compatible, cyber-resilient storage — to enterprises for active archiving, backup, and long-term retention across healthcare, media, government, and financial services.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Caringo industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Object Storage Software
- NAICS
- Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (5182), Computer Storage Device Manufacturing (334112)
- SIC
- Computer Storage Devices (3572)
- akta.pro primary industry
- Object Storage Platforms (HDABAEAC)
- akta.pro secondary industries
- Cloud Storage Core Services (Object/Block/File Storage as a Service) (HDABAAAK), Data Protection & Backup Appliances (Backup Targets, Dedup Appliances) (HDACACAI), Server Appliances (Purpose-Built: Security, Backup, Analytics, etc.) (HDACABAL)
Keywords
Where Caringo is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Austin
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Markets served
Caringo business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Technology or R&D, Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure, Operations
Caringo product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Caringo develops and supports the Swarm scalable S3-compatible object storage platform, which delivers petabyte-scale, cyber-resilient storage for active archives, backup targets, and long-term retention workloads. The offering enables centralized data management with distributed access across multiple sites and is available both as a software platform and as a prepackaged Swarm Appliance for edge, ROBO, and small IT environments.
Product overview
Caringo is associated with DataCore's Swarm object storage product line. The offering centers on Swarm, a scalable S3-compatible object storage platform designed for petabyte-scale storage, active archives, backup targets, and long-term data retention. Swarm supports distributed access across multiple sites and includes a prepackaged appliance variant for edge, ROBO, and small IT environments. Caringo hosts the Swarm Knowledge Base (KB) at caringo.atlassian.net, indicating a technical support relationship with the Swarm product. The overall portfolio is based on software-defined storage principles, offering flexibility across deployment environments.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Products and services
- Swarm
- Swarm Appliance Lightweight, prepackaged, ready-to-run appliance providing secure S3 storage for backups and active archives across edge, ROBO, and small IT environments.
Companies that use Caringo
Customer profileSegments1 record
Ideal customer profiles2 records
Caringo technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- No
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Feature1 record
Caringo partnerships and signals
Strategic signalRecent moves6 records
Expansion highlights5 records
Caringo competitors and assessment
Company assessmentEmerging players
- Backblaze B2: Backblaze B2 is an S3-compatible cloud object storage service targeting backup and long-term retention at aggressive price points; it competes with the workload Caringo serves but via a cloud-only delivery model rather than an on-prem object storage appliance.
- Wasabi Technologies: Wasabi offers S3-compatible cloud object storage marketed as low-cost hot cloud storage for backup and archive, partially overlapping with Swarm's retention use case but delivered as a consumption-based public cloud service rather than on-prem software.
Direct peers
- MinIO: MinIO provides S3-compatible object storage software deployable on-prem and in hybrid environments, competing head-to-head with Swarm on the software-defined object storage workload where cost-conscious enterprises may opt for an open-source alternative.
- Cloudian: Cloudian is a direct peer offering S3-compatible object storage for on-prem and hybrid deployments, with a similar focus on backup targets, active archives, and ransomware-resilient retention — directly competitive with Caringo's Swarm platform in target customer and use case.
- Quantum Corporation: Quantum provides object storage (ActiveScale) and tape-based archive solutions aimed at petabyte-scale long-term retention, directly overlapping with Swarm's active archive and backup-target positioning in media, research, and surveillance-driven data sets.
- Scality: Scality offers enterprise object storage (Ring) and file storage for petabyte-scale workloads including active archive and backup, with comparable S3 compatibility and on-prem deployment model, making it a direct functional peer to Caringo's Swarm.
Broad incumbents
- Dell Technologies ECS: Dell ECS (formerly Elastic Cloud Storage) is an enterprise object storage appliance competing with Swarm for active archive and backup workloads; as part of Dell's broader infrastructure portfolio it carries more channel weight but targets the same S3-compatible retention use cases.
- NetApp StorageGRID: NetApp StorageGRID is a broad-incumbent S3-compatible object storage platform sold as part of NetApp's larger hybrid cloud portfolio; it overlaps with Swarm on active archive and long-term retention but benefits from NetApp's much larger installed base and enterprise sales motion.
- Hitachi Vantara HCP: Hitachi Content Platform (HCP) is an object storage offering positioned for private cloud, archive, and regulatory retention workloads, overlapping with Swarm's active archive focus while being delivered as part of Hitachi Vantara's broader infrastructure and data management portfolio.
- IBM Spectrum Scale / Cloud Object Storage: IBM Cloud Object Storage (formerly Cleversafe) is a broad-incumbent S3-compatible object storage platform targeting enterprise archive, backup, and big data workloads, competing with Caringo for the same retention and active archive buyers at large enterprises.
Market position
Strengths4 records
Weaknesses4 records
Competitive moat3 records
Key risks1 record
Key highlights6 records
Customer concentration
Caringo social profiles
Digital presenceCaringo financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Caringo leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles4 records
Caringo funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds5 records
Investors4 records
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Caringo M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about Caringo
What does Caringo do?
Caringo develops and supports the Swarm scalable S3-compatible object storage platform, which delivers petabyte-scale, cyber-resilient storage for active archives, backup targets, and long-term retention workloads. The offering enables centralized data management with distributed access across multiple sites and is available both as a software platform and as a prepackaged Swarm Appliance for edge, ROBO, and small IT environments.
Is Caringo a public or private company?
Caringo is a private company. It is classified as corporate owned and is currently operating.
When was Caringo founded?
Caringo was founded in 2005. It employs 51 to 100 people.
Where is Caringo based?
Caringo is headquartered in Austin, United States, in the North America region.
Who are Caringo's main competitors?
Emerging players on record are Backblaze B2 and Wasabi Technologies. Direct peers are MinIO, Cloudian, Quantum Corporation and Scality. Broad incumbents are Dell Technologies ECS, NetApp StorageGRID, Hitachi Vantara HCP and IBM Spectrum Scale / Cloud Object Storage.
Does Caringo have an API?
No public API is recorded for Caringo.
What industry is Caringo in?
Caringo's product category is Object Storage Software. Its primary akta.pro industry code is HDABAEAC, Object Storage Platforms, with a secondary code of HDABAAAK, Cloud Storage Core Services (Object/Block/File Storage as a Service). Its NAICS code is 5182 and its SIC code is 3572.