AnalysisA look at Dropbox's IPO filing suggests a conservative company controlling costs and heading towards profitability this year. It has passed the 500 million user count, though only 2.2 per cent (11 million) of that base are paying customers – the rest use its free services. The firm had hosted its file sync'n'share data on AWS …

Business user file sync and sharer Box "sank" for some users late last week, who took to forums and social media complaining they could not see any of their files. One Reg reading Box user told us he'd "lost" four years' worth of files, saying: "They have no phone support... the long and short of it is that files that have …

Box has topped Gartner's magic quadrant as the analyst wizards cast their judgemental eyes over the content collaboration market. Enterprise file sync and share (EFSS) has grown up into the content collaboration market and Gartner has given it a kiss of recognition with its very own magic quadrant, continuing its EFSS magic …

Dropbox looks set to follow fellow file sync and sharer Box with an IPO. Reuters reports Dropbox is hiring underwriters to prepare a stock market launch later this year. Three years ago Dropbox went through a private fundraising event which valued it at around $10bn. Whether this valuation holds today is questionable. When …

Google and Box have each revealed new cloud backup products. Google's even got two: the one we'll see soonest, on June 28th, is “Backup and Sync from Google”. The product is a formal merger between Google Drive and Google Photos, which makes sense because at present an Android user will likely be using Google Photos almost …

AnalysisFile sync and sharer Egnyte expanded into content governance midway through last year as the collaborative file access market's maturity came into view. But the now-profitable company is not looking to make a debt-fuelled dash for growth. CEO Vineet Jain reckons Egnyte revenues can grow at 30-35 per cent without more venture …

InterviewWith the demise of Bitcasa, EMC selling off Syncplicity, and so forth, the enterprise file sync and share market might appear moribund. What’s happened is a trend of consolidation plus an addition of functionality for other content functions. EFSS on its own is no longer viable. That’s the underlying message we received from …

AnalysisCloud file storage startup Bitcasa - a firm cynics might say had an apparent death wish - has called it a day. An odd posting on its website by CEO Brian "Tap" Taptich reads: Bitcasa is no more, and this is not bad news. Thanks to the very hard work, generosity and persistence of a number of folks – from employees to …

AnalysisOn-premises file sync and share and collaboration is yesterday's story. The future is the public cloud with dedicated software service suppliers, like Box. File sync, share and collaboration is not a feature, but a product, best expressed as a service (SaaS) through Box's three data centres and the public cloud, and not …

The collaboration wars are back, only – for now – they're more like a bush battle, where the hindmost are picked off first. During the 1990s, Lotus Notes – which became IBM Notes – and Groupwise from Novell were in Microsoft’s sights. When they weren't giving customers snippets of code – known as migration wizards – to …

File sync 'n' share startup Egnyte is starting a move to expand from file management into content intelligence, entering the domain of Commvault and Veritas. Egnyte was founded in 2007 by CEO Vineet Jain, VP Product Management RAjesh Ram, and VP Operations and Chief Security Officer Kris Lahiri. It has amassed $62.5m in …

Illustrator Peter Berkowitz had been forced out of his $400-a-month box home in San Francisco after officials ruled it a fire hazard. Berkowitz became a minor celebrity when he spoke to his local NBC station about his custom built pod in the living room of his friends' house in Outer Sunset. The rent is San Francisco is so …

Rival file sharing services Box and Dropbox are gunning for massive expansion by exploiting the huge scale of IBM, Amazon’s AWS – and of Facebook. Box has announced Box Zone, storage by geographical location, using the data centres of AWS and IBM. The company has pressed the button on instant international rollouts through …

Druva has extended its base in end-point data protection to cover cloud apps Box, Google Work and Office 365. If you're working on your mobile smart device and desktop, Druva's inSync product will protect your data on that device. Now, if you are using Box, Google Work (Google Drive, Google Docs and Gmail) or Exchange Online …

AnalysisWith the stock markets on a slide since the start of the year, the usual game of over-hyping companies that are doing well has flipped and now the game is to give companies – particularly tech stocks – a good kicking on the way down. Much of the current frenzy appears built around Twitter, which is having a bad year, and the …

Salesforce and Box have announced new integration features, including an SDK for developers. Salesforce Files Connect for Box enables access to files stored in Box for users on the Salesforce platform. Box content can be connected to Salesforce records, users or groups. The Box SDK for Salesforce, available on GitHub, is a …

A well-informed storage industry source with close ties to startups suggests that Pure's IPO could happen as early as next week – yes, the one beginning Monday, October 5. We expected it to be delayed to mid-2016 to allow Pure to get better quarter-on-quarter growth numbers. But our insider said companies these days don't file …

Cloud storage provider Box easily beat its estimated revenue target for its second quarter, with double-digit growth over the year, and lifted its estimated full-year revenue number. Losses also deepened however, but at a lower annual rate of 33.6 per cent, and shares rose 2.66 per cent to $14.27 as investors patted CEO Aaron …