YottaYotta's Gotta Problem

Utility storage startup YottaYotta Inc. announced late Friday that president and CEO Steve Mattioli has resigned and that the company has shut down its headquarters office in Kirkland, Wash. (see YottaYotta Closes Kirkland Office).

Does this foreshadow the demise of the firm, which only last month claimed to have landed its first customers? (See YottaYotta Gotta Customer.)

Whatever happens, this latest news is certainly not a positive development. Cindy Salazar, director of marketing and communications at YottaYotta, says the Kirkland office employed 16 people in administrative and executive functions. The startup's board of directors made the decision to close the office -- and relocate YottaYotta's headquarters to Edmonton, Alberta -- this week, she says. Some employees may relocate but it's not clear how many will do so, according to Salazar.

At last count, YottaYotta had 126 employees after laying off 25, or 17 percent of its workforce, last summer. Most of those are in the company's Edmonton office, where its product development team is located. YottaYotta will maintain its manufacturing and systems integration facility in Boulder, Colo. -- for now, anyway (see YottaYotta Still in the Game?).

Meanwhile, Salazar says she doesn't know why Mattioli resigned. Byte and Switch could not immediately reach Mattioli for comment. YottaYotta says a search for a new CEO is underway.In the interim, the company has appointed Tony Brogden executive VP of operations. Before joining YottaYotta in April 2002 as VP of engineering, Brogden was executive VP and general manager at Distributed Processing Technology (DPT), a developer of SCSI RAID controllers acquired by Adaptec Inc. (Nasdaq: ADPT) in December 1999. Prior to DPT, he held management and engineering positions with McDonnell Aircraft (now part of Boeing Co.) and Martin Marietta Electronics and Aerospace (now Lockheed Martin Corp.).

YottaYotta has received $50 million in funding to date from investors including Banc of America Securities LLC, The Grosvenor Funds, Optical Capital Group, and Morgan Keegan & Company Inc. (see Does YottaYotta Gotta Lotta Cash? and YottaYotta Lands $26M).

Todd Spangler, US Editor, Byte and Switch