Carmel Ventures

NEW YORK, June 6, 2007ג€”OpTierג„¢, the leader in business transaction management, today announced that it has raised an additional $15 million in funding from new investor Gemini Israel Funds and existing investors Pitango Venture Capital, Carmel Ventures, and Lightspeed Venture Partners. .

Over the past year, OpTier has continued to expand its deployments within Fortune 500 organizations. OpTierג€™s innovation and momentum with Fortune 500 customers have positioned the company as a leader in Business Transaction Management. OpTierג€™s management team will use the funding to aggressively pursue plans to enhance the companyג€™s offerings, expand industry partnerships and fuel sales and marketing. The company will also broaden employee recruitment in the U.S., Europe and Israel.

 ג€œThrough innovation and a keen understanding of IT needs, OpTierג€™s management team has succeeded in making CoreFirst a strategic IT investment for the worldג€™s largest organizations" said Adi Pundak-Mintz , General Partner with Gemini Israel Funds,  "We took the majority stake in this round as we believe the company is now well positioned for rapid growth in a strong technology market. We are also excited to join the great investor team that has been with the company from the first round.ג€

OpTierג€™s flagship product, CoreFirst, dynamically links business services to IT infrastructure, assuring service delivery and optimizing IT resources. Its unique Business Transaction Management technology delivers end-to-end visibility and control of all business transactions, all the time. CoreFirst automatically discovers, tracks, monitors and profiles all transactions ג€“ across all tiers ג€“ to clearly map IT business service topology. This improves collaboration among different stakeholders by providing them with a common transactional context, reducing the cost and time to resolve application and platform performance issues.

Since the debut of CoreFirst in 2005, OpTier has been recognized by the industry for its unique approach to business transaction management. In March 2006, Gartner, Inc., named OpTier a ג€œCool Vendor in IT Operations Management, 2006.ג€ Forrester Research named OpTier a strong performer in the firmג€™s latest Waveג„¢ report on Business Service Management. According to Evelyn Hubbert, a senior analyst in Forresterג€™s IT systems, ג€œ[CoreFirstג€™s] core ability lies with mapping business services, prioritizing critical business processes supporting the services, analyzing the performance of the underlying infrastructure and taking corrective actions.ג€

CoreFirst was chosen as a 2006 Software and Information Industry Association CODiE Awards Finalist in the Best Software Testing Solution category. The company also received the Datamation.com Product of the Year 2006 Award in the IT/Business alignment category, and OpTier was listed as one of the ג€œCompanies to Watchג€ in Network Computingג€™s Survivor Guide to 2006.

ג€œWe estimate that CoreFirst currently manages millions of transactions flowing through corporate IT infrastructures hourly, continuously aligning IT and business goals, improving service delivery and delivering rapid ROI,ג€ said Israel Mazin, CEO & Chairman of the Board at OpTier. ג€œWe are delighted that Gemini Israel Funds has joined our world-class investors Pitango Venture Capital, Carmel Ventures and Lightspeed Venture Partners with funding that will enable us to build on our market leadership. The industry views OpTier as an excellent investment, especially as investors become more confident about leading edge companies in the technology sector.ג€

OpTierג„¢ provides software solutions that dynamically link business services to underlying IT infrastructure, assuring service delivery and optimizing IT resources. Its unique Business Transaction Managementג„¢ technology ג€“ which delivers end-to-end visibility and control of all business transactions ג€“ makes effective Business Service Management a reality. OpTier tracks and monitors all business transactions ג€“ across all tiers, all the time. It identifies and isolates performance problems as they develop, thus minimizing the cost to resolve them. OpTier generates intelligence, for more effective testing, capacity planning, provisioning and decision-making. It can further prioritize transaction resource allocation based on business needs. For more information, visit www.optier.com.

A pioneer in Israelג€™s venture capital industry, Gemini Israel Funds has grown to be the leading Israeli seed and early stage fund in the Information Technology arena.   The firm, founded in 1993, manages $550 million in four funds.  Investments are focused on Communications and Wireless Technologies, Enterprise Software, Internet, Consumer Electronics and Semiconductors.   Through offices in Israel and Silicon Valley, Gemini offers portfolio companies with access to top-tier U.S. based investors and a global network of corporate partners.  As investment professionals, Geminiג€™s key contributions include an ability to make daring investment decisions and the capability to utilize past operational experience in assisting portfolio companies. Past successes include: Allot, Mellanox, Saifun, Precise, Butterfly, Commtouch, Ornet, Verisity, Jacada, Ceragon, Riverhead, nLayers and others.  More information can be found at www.gemini.co.il.

Pitango Venture Capital, the leading venture capital firm in Israel, has been investing in technology entrepreneurs since 1993. With offices in Israel, California and London, Pitango currently manages over $1 billion in committed capital invested in more than 100 companies. Pitango specializes in providing long-term support and value-added services to its portfolio companies, with a focus on seed to late-stage companies in Communications, Network and Storage, Wireless and Mobile, Enterprise Software and Internet Infrastructure, and Life Sciences including Biotech and Medical Devices. More information about Pitango is available at: www.pitango.com.

Founded in 2000 by pioneers and leaders of the Israeli high tech industry, Carmel Ventures is one of Israelג€™s leading information technology focused funds with $372 million under management.  Led by former entrepreneurs and executives of the software, communications and investment industries, Carmel provides active, hands-on support to its portfolio companies.  Carmel headquartered in Herzliya, Israel enjoys a worldwide network of industry, strategic and investment resources.  Carmel provides significant capital and support through the growth cycle of its portfolio companies and is recognized as a true company building fund in Israel. For more information, please visit www.carmelventures.com.

About Lightspeed
Lightspeed Venture Partners combines extensive venture capital and operating experience to assist entrepreneurs in creating industry-leading technology companies. Lightspeed manages $2.3 billion in funds and focuses on early-stage investments in the United States and Israel.

The partners of Lightspeed have contributed to the success of more than 275 companies since 1971, including AirGate PCS, Brocade, Ciena, Electronics for Imaging, FedEx, Galileo Technology, Genesys Telecommunications Laboratories, Informatica, Kiva Software, Phone.com, Quantum Effect Devices, Sirocco Systems and Vantive.