Pentaho Corp., an open-source vendor of business intelligence software, has secured $12 million in Series C financing and hopes to use it to grow while the largest software vendors are busy consolidating their recent acquisitions in the space.

New investor Benchmark Capital led the round, which closed earlier this month. It also included participation from existing investors Index Ventures and New Enterprise Associates. The company would not disclose its valuation.

"Right now there is a lot of uncertainty around business intelligence," said Pentaho Chief Executive Richard Daley, referring to the acquisitions last year of the three largest business intelligence software companies - Business Objects SA, Cognos Inc. and Hyperion Solutions Corp., by SAP AG, International Business Machines Corp. and Oracle Corp., respectively.

Pentaho, based in Orlando, Fla., is hoping to use the proceeds of the round to "take up a lot of the space that was left behind by those vendors" by growing its sales, marketing and product development efforts, as well as expanding internationally, Daley said.

In addition to competing against three of the world's largest traditional software vendors, the company also faces competition from software-as-a-service companies PivotLink Inc., LucidEra Inc. and Quaris Corp.

Its most direct competitor is another open-source business intelligence company, JasperSoft Corp., which is backed by DCM, Morgenthaler Ventures, Partech International, SAP Ventures and Scale Venture Partners. Pentaho differentiates itself from JasperSoft through the use of metadata - data about data that makes it easier to create and maintain reports - and by having a larger suite of products, Daley said.

Pentaho was founded in 2004 and has a "couple hundred" paying customers, including Cox Communications Inc., Sun Microsystems Inc. and Wachovia Corp., Daley said.

The company began its European expansion last year when it opened a sales office in Belgium. It plans on using the new funding to grow in Europe and set up shop in Asia Pacific, Daley said.

This round should be enough to take the company to profitability, Daley said, adding that he does not expect to raise another round of venture capital. Pentaho does not have a specific exit plan, he said.

Pentaho raised a $5 million Series A round in December 2005, followed seven months later by an $8 million Series B round. Both were led by New Enterprise Associates with participation from Index Ventures. Prior to raising venture capital, the company was financed with about $500,000 from its founders.

Peter Fenton, a general partner with Benchmark Capital, will take a seat on the company's board as a result of the new round.