SngleHop

SingleHop, established in 2006, operated as a provider of automated Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) and cloud computing. The company was founded by Zak Boca and Dan Ushman, two entrepreneurs who first met as teenagers in an AOL chat room and had previously launched a shared hosting platform called midPhase in 2003. Recognizing that their midPhase clients were outgrowing shared hosting, they started SingleHop to offer a pathway to dedicated servers. After selling midPhase in 2007, Boca and Ushman focused entirely on developing SingleHop, which saw significant revenue growth, reaching $22 million by 2011. A major milestone was securing a $27.5 million venture funding round from Battery Ventures in 2012. The company's trajectory culminated in its acquisition by Internap Corporation (INAP) for $132 million in cash in February 2018.

SingleHop's business model centered on delivering highly automated, on-demand IT infrastructure. The company served a diverse client base, from small businesses to large enterprises across various industries, including e-commerce, healthcare, and finance. By the time of its acquisition, it served approximately 3,000 customers in 114 countries. Revenue was generated through the sale of dedicated servers, public and private cloud hosting, and managed services. The core of its offering was the LEAP management platform, a proprietary automation engine that allowed clients to manage bare metal servers and cloud products from a single interface without needing direct support. This platform provided features like remote server management and rebooting, which was a key differentiator.

The company's product suite included bare metal dedicated servers, public and private cloud solutions, and managed hosting services. A key feature was the ability to combine the flexibility of cloud computing with the performance of dedicated physical servers. SingleHop operated out of Tier 3 data centers in Chicago, Arizona, and the Netherlands, ensuring redundancy and security. The firm was noted for its customer service, outlining guarantees on service deployment time and support ticket response in a "Customer's Bill of Rights". Following the acquisition by INAP, SingleHop's automated platform was integrated to enhance INAP's capabilities, and its team, including CEO Zak Boca who became INAP's CMO, was absorbed to strengthen INAP's managed hosting division.

Keywords: IaaS, cloud hosting, dedicated servers, managed hosting, data center services, IT infrastructure, cloud automation, private cloud, bare metal servers, web hosting, Zak Boca, Dan Ushman, INAP acquisition, cloud management, enterprise hosting, automated infrastructure, server management, LEAP platform, colocation, managed services