DB Capital Venture Partners, the venture capital arm of Deutsche Bank, has invested $15m (€17.2m) in PowerDsine, the power software firm.

PowerDsine raised a total of $30m in the financing round. The other investors included Dain Rauscher Wessels Partners, Robertson Stephens Partners and a number of existing shareholders. PowerDsine will use the funding to develop its technology which enables safe and reliable delivery of operating power, together with voice and data, on standard local area network (LAN) cables. Michael Patton, managing director and co-head of DB Capital Venture Partners, has joined PowerDsine's board of directors. &quotPower over LAN is set to become an important technology as IP telephony and other network devices realise the need for a high-availability power supply. The world standards bodies have recognised this and have been active in developing the standard for this technology,&quot he said.