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ServiceNow Acquires ElasticSearch Alternative, Observability Startup Era Software

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ServiceNow is acquiring Era Software, which positions itself as an ElasticSearch alternative for observability, log management and cybersecurity use cases. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

This is technology M&A deal number 872 that ChannelE2E has covered so far in 2022.

ServiceNow Acquires Era Software: Background and Use Cases

Era Software, founded in 2019, is based in Seattle, Washington. The company has 47 employees listed on LinkedIn.

Era Software raised $15.25 million in 2021, led by Playground Global, and had raised about $22 million in total since inception.

Era Software allows organizations to "manage their data in real time, at a high scale, and at up to 90% lower cost than alternatives," the company asserts. As a result, IT and security organizations can "innovate faster with unified access to observability data," the seller adds.

ServiceNow will align Era Software with the Lightstep acquisition of 2021. The Lightstep deal had some implications for unified IT service management (ITSM) and application monitoring. But ServiceNow has also extended far beyond the ITSM market in recent years, emphasizing workflow automation across finance, HR, SecOps and other operational departments.

Looking ahead, the combined Era-Lightstep solutions will accelerate "ServiceNow’s path toward unified telemetry (logs, metrics, traces)," the buyer said.

Executive Perspectives

In a prepared statement about the deal, Ben Sigelman, general manager of ServiceNow’s Lightstep business unit, said:

“Digital transformation succeeds or fails based on unified observability. Together, ServiceNow and Era Software are set up to deliver a unified and seamless observability experience within one solution, designed to scale.”

Added Todd Persen, CEO and co-founder at Era Software:

"At Era Software, we created solutions to simplify the complex challenges of managing large volumes of observability data, with a particular focus on log management. We have always believed that observability should span across the enterprise. We are excited to join ServiceNow, as we further build a customer centric model of observability that can help transform the way people work."

MSP Software: Observability Options?

Within the SMB-focused software market, few companies are discussing end-to-end observability and visibility use cases. One exception is Liongard, which continues to describe how end-to-end visibility will allow MSPs to further automate their businesses and thereby improve profit margins.

Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri is co-founder & editorial director of MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E, the two leading news & analysis sites for managed service providers in the cybersecurity market.