Ceph Foundation
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2018
- HeadquartersSan Francisco, United States
- Headcount1–10
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
Ceph Foundation firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Ceph Foundation
- Legal name
- Ceph Foundation
- Website
- https://ceph.com
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2018
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 1–10 employees
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Where Ceph Foundation is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- San Francisco
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Markets served
Ceph Foundation business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Others
Revenue model
- Open Source Software Distribution: Ceph is distributed as free, open-source software under LGPLv2. The product itself is not sold; instead, the Foundation generates revenue through tiered membership fees from organizations that wish to support and influence the project.
- Foundation Membership Fees: Organizations pay annual membership fees to join the Ceph Foundation: Silver ($10,000-$15,000), Gold ($24,000-$30,000), Platinum ($40,000-$50,000), Diamond ($80,000-$100,000). Associate membership is free for nonprofits/educational institutions.
- Enterprise Support Services: While Ceph itself is free, member organizations like Red Hat, IBM, and others provide commercial support, training, and services around Ceph deployments.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Freemium | Annual | Associate Membership (Free for nonprofits/educational institutions) |
| Subscription | Annual | Silver Membership |
| Subscription | Annual | Gold Membership |
| Subscription | Annual | Platinum Membership |
| Subscription | Annual | Diamond Membership |
Go-to-market motion3 records
Distribution channels5 records
Marketing channels10 records
Ceph Foundation product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Ceph Foundation is a non-profit directed fund under the Linux Foundation that coordinates industry collaboration, membership funding, and community programs to support the Ceph open-source distributed storage project. The Foundation does not sell software; Ceph itself is free under LGPLv2, and the Foundation generates operating revenue through tiered annual membership dues (Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond) paid by commercial organizations seeking to support and influence the project.
Product overview
Ceph Foundation offers Ceph, an open-source distributed storage system with a unified architecture that combines object, block, and file storage in a single platform. The core technology is RADOS (Reliable Autonomic Distributed Object Store), which manages data at petabyte scale. The product portfolio includes RGW (RADOS Gateway) for S3/Swift-compatible object storage, RBD (RADOS Block Device) for block storage with thin provisioning and snapshots, and CephFS for POSIX-compliant file storage. Additional modules include LIBRADOS for native application APIs, the Crimson OSD for high-performance NVMe-optimized storage daemons, and Seastore as the next-generation storage backend. The Cephadm utility provides container-native cluster deployment and management.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Products and services
- Ceph Ceph is an open-source, distributed storage system providing unified object, block, and file storage interfaces from a single cluster built on commodity hardware, designed for exabyte-scale deployments with self-healing and self-managing capabilities via the CRUSH algorithm. Distributed free of charge under LGPLv2 to organizations worldwide, including enterprises, governments, cloud providers, and academic institutions.
- Ceph Foundation Membership Tiered annual membership program for organizations that wish to support and influence the Ceph open-source project, with Silver ($10K-$15K), Gold ($24K-$30K), Platinum ($40K-$50K), and Diamond ($80K-$100K) tiers for commercial organizations, plus a free Associate tier for nonprofits, educational institutions, and government agencies. Membership benefits include brand logo placement, board seats (Platinum and Diamond), event passes, marketing working group participation, and strategic influence over the Ceph roadmap.
Quantifiable outcome
- Exabyte-scale storage capacity with thousands of clients
- +3 more outcomes
Companies that use Ceph Foundation
Customer profileNamed customers9 records
Segments5 records
Ideal customer profiles2 records
Ceph Foundation technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration7 records
AI capability2 records
Feature7 records
Ceph Foundation partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
Ten partnerships are on record, tiered flagship and core.
- Linux FoundationflagshipThe Ceph Foundation is organized under the Linux Foundation, which provides financial, logistical, and governance support. The Linux Foundation accelerates open source development by providing infrastructure, support for developers, events, marketing, and community facilitation.
- Red HatcoreRed Hat provides significant technical contributions to Ceph, employs multiple core team members including Patrick Donnelly, Neha Ojha, and others. Red Hat offers commercial Ceph support and is a key contributor to the project's technical direction.
- IBMcoreIBM is a Diamond member of the Ceph Foundation and contributes technical resources including engineers working on Ceph development, RGW, and community programs. IBM also sponsors Google Summer of Code participants.
- BloombergcoreBloomberg is a Diamond member of the Ceph Foundation with engineers contributing to Ceph development, particularly in storage infrastructure improvements and RGW features.
- Western DigitalcoreWestern Digital is a Platinum member of the Ceph Foundation, contributing to storage technology development and supporting the Ceph community.
- CERNcoreCERN is an Associate member of the Ceph Foundation, using Ceph for large-scale scientific data storage requirements.
- DigitalOceancoreDigitalOcean is a Silver member of the Ceph Foundation and uses Ceph for their cloud infrastructure storage needs.
- Samsung ElectronicscoreSamsung is a Diamond member contributing engineers to work on Ceph, particularly in areas like NVMe-oF environments and storage software development.
- 45drivescore45drives is a Diamond member of the Ceph Foundation, providing storage solutions built on Ceph technology.
- CLYSOcoreCLYSO is a Diamond member of the Ceph Foundation, offering Ceph-focused consulting and support services. CLYSO's founder leads the Ceph Ambassadors program.
Scale indicators4 records
Recent moves6 records
Expansion highlights6 records
Ceph Foundation competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- Scality: Vendor of distributed object and file storage (RING and Artesca) that competes head-to-head with Ceph for enterprise and service-provider deployments; closely comparable technology and customer segments.
- OpenInfra Foundation: Foundation supporting the OpenStack project (including Swift object storage and Cinder block storage that overlap with Ceph RGW/RBD), under comparable Linux Foundation-style governance and corporate sponsorship.
- Apache Software Foundation: Independent nonprofit foundation stewarding a large portfolio of open source projects with vendor-neutral governance and corporate sponsorship — directly comparable organizational model to the Ceph Foundation.
- MinIO: Commercial S3-compatible distributed object storage software that competes directly with Ceph RGW for object storage workloads, including Kubernetes-native deployments; highly relevant technology peer.
- Eclipse Foundation: Large independent open source foundation hosting Java/Jakarta EE and many other projects under a vendor-neutral model analogous to the Ceph Foundation's structure under Linux Foundation.
- Cloud Native Computing Foundation: Sister sub-foundation under the Linux Foundation supporting cloud-native open source projects such as Kubernetes, Prometheus and Rook (Ceph's Kubernetes operator). Closely comparable governance model, funding mechanisms, and member ecosystem.
Others
- MariaDB Foundation: Small Linux Foundation-style nonprofit foundation stewarding the MariaDB open source database; similar scale and governance model to the Ceph Foundation but in a different (database) technology domain.
Broad incumbents
- Dell Technologies: Broad enterprise storage incumbent (PowerScale, ECS object storage, PowerStore) that competes with Ceph for on-premises unified and object storage workloads at large enterprises.
- Red Hat: Sole steward of the Ceph trademark and employer of most core engineers; sells the commercial Red Hat Ceph Storage product that directly competes with the open-source community distribution the Foundation supports.
Emerging players
- VAST Data: Fast-growing distributed storage platform optimized for AI, analytics and large-scale unstructured data — an emerging competitor targeting workloads (AI/ML, HPC) where Ceph's Crimson OSD roadmap is also aiming.
Market position
Strengths5 records
Weaknesses5 records
Competitive moat6 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights6 records
Customer concentration
Ceph Foundation social profiles
Digital presenceCeph Foundation financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Ceph Foundation leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles1 record
Ceph Foundation funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds
Investors
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Ceph Foundation 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 Ceph Foundation
What does Ceph Foundation do?
Ceph Foundation is a non-profit directed fund under the Linux Foundation that coordinates industry collaboration, membership funding, and community programs to support the Ceph open-source distributed storage project. The Foundation does not sell software; Ceph itself is free under LGPLv2, and the Foundation generates operating revenue through tiered annual membership dues (Silver, Gold, Platinum, Diamond) paid by commercial organizations seeking to support and influence the project.
Is Ceph Foundation a public or private company?
Ceph Foundation is a private company. It is classified as nonprofit foundation owned and is currently operating.
When was Ceph Foundation founded?
Ceph Foundation was founded in 2018. It employs 1 to 10 people.
Where is Ceph Foundation based?
Ceph Foundation is headquartered in San Francisco, United States, in the North America region.
How does Ceph Foundation make money?
Three revenue lines are on record. Open Source Software Distribution is the primary driver. The others are foundation Membership Fees and enterprise Support Services.
Who are Ceph Foundation's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are Scality, OpenInfra Foundation, Apache Software Foundation, MinIO, Eclipse Foundation and Cloud Native Computing Foundation. MariaDB Foundation is listed as an others. Broad incumbents are Dell Technologies and Red Hat. VAST Data is listed as an emerging player.
Does Ceph Foundation have an API?
Yes. Ceph provides multiple APIs for developer integration: LIBRADOS provides native application libraries for direct connectivity to RADOS; RGW (RADOS Gateway) provides S3-compatible and Swift-compatible REST APIs for object storage; application libraries in the form of LIBRADOS enable direct application connectivity. The Ceph Dashboard is built using Angular and TypeScript on the frontend with Python on the backend. Developer documentation is at docs.ceph.com/en/latest.