Tegile Systems Inc. is leveling the playing field in the hyper-competitive world of hybrid storage arrays with the completion of a landmark $70 million funding round from over a half dozen new and existing investors. The capital infusion brings its balance sheet much more up to par with that of its fastest-growing rivals.

With a total of $115 million raised so far, the company is now a digit closer to Tintri Systems Inc. and Pure Storage Inc., which have both been quicker to seize upon the massive investor interest surrounding flash and hybrid systems in particular. But Tegile has nonetheless managed to establish itself as a force to be reckoned with in the segment with over 1,500 units shipped so far.

As is the case with its rivals, the popularity of the company’s architecture stems not so much from the hardware itself as from the homegrown software running on top, which uses a combination of storage optimizations to significantly increase the return on the underlying storage. Tegile also provides essential management functionality to help administrators allocate that capacity more efficiently.

The combined package is finding use powering virtual desktops, which benefit from combining the speed of flash with the cost-efficiency of disk for persistent storage, but also increasingly databases and virtualized applications since Tegile’s entry into the all-flash segment. That expansion has contributed to a 350 percent increase in sales over the last year, which the new funding is meant to help fuel.

The round includes contributions from Capricorn Investment Group, the venture capital fund of original eBay, Inc. president Jeffrey Skoll, Cross Creek Advisors and Pine River Capital Management along with all of Tegile’s existing backers. Standing out in particular are Western Digital Technologies Inc. And Sandisk Corp, the leading disk and solid-state memory drive manufacturers, respectively, which have a vested interested in owning a part of one of the industry’s fastest-growing hybrid array vendors.

Tegile will spend the new capital on sustaining that momentum with more hires and increased efforts to attract resellers. The funding comes as a timely shot in the arm for the company amid intensifying competition from not only fellow startups such as Tintri and Pure but also more established vendors likewise vying for a slice of the lucrative flash storage market.