Is The Force With Carbonite CEO David Friend?

As Director J.J. Abrams prepares Star Wars Episode VII, here’s a quick piece of geek trivia: How did Carbonite, the cloud-based backup provider, choose its corporate name? Turns out CEO David Friend is obsessed with the Star Wars universe — including the Carbonite that froze Han Solo and nearly packaged up Luke Skywalker for a chilly trip to The Emperor. But how does The VAR Guy (a Star Wars fanatic himself) know about Friend’s Star Wars interest?

A short time ago in a galaxy you all know, The VAR Guy compared 10 cloud trends to the Star Wars universe. During the presentation, delivered at Tech Data’s TDCloud Summit in Tampa, Fla., a Carbonite employee confirmed that the company name was inspired by Star Wars. Side note: Tech Data announced a cloud distribution with Carbonite at the conference.)

Behind the Name

Think of it this way: Carbonite’s cloud backup service freezes data in time for safe keeping, much in the way that a certain Lord of the Sith put Han Solo in his deep freeze. As C-3PO put it: “He should be quite well protected. If he survived the freezing process, that is.”

Carbonite’s headquarters in Boston includes meeting rooms and destinations inspired by the original Star Wars trilogy. But The VAR Guy wonders: Do any hallways lead to a Cantina bar — or a famed Han Solo Carbonite desk? 

Now that would be worth another blog entry… After all: Everybody loves a good sequel. Let’s all hope J.J. Abrams delivers a great one with Episode VII in 2015.