Barracuda Networks, Inc. is a company providing security, networking and storage products based on network appliances and cloud services. The company's security products include products for protection against email, web surfing, web hackers and instant messaging threats such as spam, spyware, trojans, and viruses. The company's networking and storage products include web filtering, load balancing, application delivery controllers, message archiving, NG firewalls, backup services and data protection. History Barracuda Networks was founded in 2003 by Dean Drako (founding CEO), Michael Perone, and Zach Levow; the company introduced the Barracuda Spam and Virus Firewall in the same year. In 2007 the company moved its headquarters to Campbell, California, and opened an office in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In January 2006, it closed its first outside investment of $40 million from Sequoia Capital and Francisco Partners. On January 29, 2008, Barracuda Networks was sued by Trend Micro over their use of the open source anti-virus software Clam AntiVirus, which Trend Micro claimed to be in violation of their patent on 'anti-virus detection on an SMTP or FTP gateway'. In addition to providing samples of prior art in an effort to render Trend Micro's patent invalid, in July 2008 Barracuda launched a countersuit against Trend Micro claiming Trend Micro violated several antivirus patents Barracuda Networks had acquired from IBM. In December 2008, the company launched the BRBL (Barracuda Reputation Block List), its proprietary and dynamic list of known spam servers, for free and public use in blocking spam at the gateway. Soon after opening BRBL many IP addresses got blacklisted without apparent reason and without any technical explanation. As of October 2009, Barracuda had over 85,000 customers. As of November, 2011, Barracuda had more than 130,000 customers. As of January, 2014, Barracuda has more than 150,000 customers worldwide. In 2012, the company became a co-sponsor of the Garmin-Barracuda UCI ProTour cycling team and entitlement sponsor of the 2011 Indianapolis 500 champion Bryan Herta Autosport in the IndyCar Series, with the #98 Lotus driven by Alex Tagliani, who will defend the team's championship. Barracuda Networks expanded its research and development facility in Ann Arbor to a 12,500 square foot office building on Depot Street in 2008. By 2012, the Michigan-based research division had grown to about 180 employees, again outgrowing its space. In June, 2012, Barracuda signed a lease to occupy the 45,000 square foot office complex previously used as the Borders headquarters on Maynard