Most promising start-up in 2005: Mellanox.

(From Israel Business Arena)

Byline: Ofer Levi

Mellanox Technologies has been chosen as the most promising start-up in Israel in 2005. Mellanox develops InfiniBand solutions that facilitate high-speed information transmission between clusters of computers, storage components, and servers.

It is not beyond the realm of possibility that by the time next year's most promising start-up is chosen, Mellanox will already have held a Nasdaq IPO at a company value in the hundreds of millions of dollars. The company achieved profitability last quarter, and has estimated annual sales of over $40 million. CEO Eyal Waldman wants a mega-IPO. He's waiting for Mellanox to grow further before he starts the process, one company investor told me.

Mellanox regularly appears on Red Herring magazine's 100 Europe list of private companies in Europe and Israel that play a leading role in innovation and technology. Several weeks ago, the company also made sixth place on the list of the top ten private companies compiled by Byte and Switch, a widely respected storage website.

Mellanox began when Waldman, co-founder and former VP engineering at Galileo Technologies, left that company a …