Zambeel COO Skedaddles

NAS startup Zambeel Inc. has been dealt another blow with the resignation of chief operating officer Karl Schubert, sources tell Byte and Switch.

A source knowledgeable about Zambeel's plans says Schubert is waltzing out the door. However, this source says his exit has no bearing on the company's survivability.

"I think the issue they face is the same as many -- it's a crappy economy," says the source. "While their demise is possible, it's no more so than 90 percent of the other startups out there."

Neither Schubert nor Zambeel representatives responded to email and phone messages requesting comment. Zambeel's external P.R. agency says it is no longer working with the company.

Still, Schubert's departure comes amid rumors that Zambeel is running low on funding. The Fremont, Calif.-based company, founded in September 1999, has received $65 million to date from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, New Enterprise Associates (NEA), Integral Capital Partners, Amerindo Investment Advisors Inc., and other investors."Karl has resigned and the company is running on fumes," says another source close to the company, who requested anonymity. "The bridge loan only lasts through February, and no one is buying the product. The sales team was given objectives by potential investors; those objectives have not been met."

Zambeel has already gone through one round of layoffs: In August 2002, the company cut 25 percent of its staff, leaving it with about 90 employees (see 30 Zambeelians Get Pink Slips).

Schubert came to Zambeel from Dell Computer Corp. (Nasdaq: DELL), where he served most recently as CTO. While at Dell, he defined technology and product directions for its enterprise servers and storage systems. Prior to Dell, Schubert spent 14 years at IBM Corp. (NYSE: IBM) in various technical roles.

Since it launched its distributed NAS system last summer, Zambeel has landed two paying customers: the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC) at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. However, according to our sources, those customers paid less than half what the hardware cost (see Zambeel Slams Windows Shut and Research Lab Picks Zambeel