Red Hat would not comment on whether it was considering a purchase of JasperSoft "for obvious reasons," said Dion Cornett, Red Hat's vice president of strategic alliances, in an e-mail.

Cornett added that Red Hat decides which RHX partners to invest in "on a case-by-case basis considering a wide variety of factors."

Private equity firm Adams Street Partners is leading the round of funding for JasperSoft, and David Welsh, a partner at the firm, is joining JasperSoft's board.

JasperSoft plans to use the funding to scale up its business operations worldwide, the company said. It also will use it to enhance its products, expand globally, and build and fortify new partner relationships.

In addition to its software business, JasperSoft has an online developer collaboration forum, , with more than 89,000 registered developers working on more than 320 Jasper-related products.