Venafi Announces $39 Million in New Funding as Market Need to Protect Keys and Certificates Grows

SALT LAKE CITY, June 30, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Venafi, the Immune System for the Internet™ and leading provider of Next Generation Trust Protection, today announced that it has received $39 million in additional funding. The financing was led by QuestMark Partners and other new investors Intel Capital and Silver Lake Waterman and existing investors. The investment will accelerate development of the Venafi Trust Protection Platform™ to secure more Global 5000 businesses and governments and support its fast-growing worldwide customer base.

Venafi protects the Global 5000 as the Immune System for the Internet by securing the foundation of all cybersecurity – cryptographic keys and digital certificates. Cybercriminals know that Global 5000 enterprises 1) do not know where or what keys and certificates are in use in the organization, 2) do not know if and when the bad guys install a stolen or forged certificate, and 3) cannot quickly and completely find and replace certificates and keys when used in an attack.

With a compromised, stolen, or forged key and certificate, attackers can impersonate, surveil, and monitor their targets' websites, infrastructure, clouds, mobile devices, and system administrators, and decrypt communications thought to be private. And when that happens, intellectual property is lost and reputation is damaged. The last 12 month's most significant vulnerabilities and breaches, including Heartbleed and attacks on Sony Pictures, demonstrate how unsecured keys and certificates provide the trusted status cybercriminals need to go undetected for long periods and circumvent existing security controls.

"Digital certificates and cryptographic keys are the foundation of Internet security and Venafi is the leading cybersecurity platform for securing them," said Ben Schapiro, founder and partner of QuestMark Partners. "Venafi is highly unique and addresses a real blind spot that's underappreciated by many enterprises and represents a huge IT security risk. With its unique products, strong leadership team, and sophisticated enterprise customer base, Venafi is perfectly positioned as the need to protect keys and certificates continues to grow."

"Cybercriminals continue to increase the frequency and sophistication of their attacks targeting organizations and their valuable assets," said Raja Patel, vice president of Intel Security Group and general manager of its Network Security business unit. "Intel Capital believes Venafi, with its unique approach to automating the complex task of managing digital certificates and cryptographic keys, is transforming the way enterprises and government organizations distinguish between what is trusted and what is not. We are confident our investment will help Venafi to continue enhancing their offerings and help enterprises protect the integrity of their communications and data."

"From online banking and mobile applications to the Internet of Things, everything IP-based relies upon a key and certificate to create a trusted connection. As the Immune System for the Internet, Venafi secures this foundation of security that the global economy runs on," said Jeff Hudson, CEO of Venafi. "Unfortunately, we live in a world without trust today because there is no immune system to detect keys and certificates that do not belong and are being misused as the bad guys accelerate their attacks. Venafi already protects four out of the top five U.S. banks, eight of the top ten U.S. health insurance companies and four of the top seven U.S. retailers, all of whom rely on Venafi as mission-critical security to secure their keys and certificates from misuse. This new funding will allow us to advance our Next Generation Trust Protection platform to protect the rest of the Global 5000."

About QuestMark Partners

QuestMark Partners is an expansion-stage venture capital firm, providing growth capital to exceptional management teams across the U.S. With over $900 million under management, QuestMark targets highly-differentiated, often category-creating companies with the commercial traction and strategic position to support long-term standalone success. Since its founding in 1998, QuestMark's collaborative, insightful, and patient approach to company building has helped many entrepreneurial firms become market leaders, across a range of industries. For more information on QuestMark, visit www.questmarkpartners.com or follow @QuestMarkVC.

About Intel Capital 

Intel Capital, Intel's global investment organization, makes equity investments in innovative technology start-ups and companies worldwide. Intel Capital invests in a broad range of companies offering hardware, software, and services targeting enterprise, mobility, consumer Internet, digital media and semiconductor manufacturing. Since 1991, Intel Capital has invested more than US$11.4 billion in over 1,400 companies in 57 countries. In that timeframe, 211 portfolio companies have gone public on various exchanges around the world, and 369 were acquired or participated in a merger. For more information on what makes Intel Capital one of the world's most powerful venture capital firms, visit www.intelcapital.com or follow @Intelcapital.

About Silver Lake Waterman

Silver Lake Waterman is part of Silver Lake, the global leader in technology investing with over $26 billion in combined assets under management and committed capital and a team of approximately 100 investment and value creation professionals located around the world. Silver Lake Waterman provides flexible expansion capital to later-stage growth companies in the technology and technology-enabled industries. For more information about Silver Lake Waterman and Silver Lake, please visit www.silverlake.com.

About Venafi

Venafi is the Immune System for the Internet™ that protects the foundation of all cybersecurity—cryptographic keys and digital certificates—so they can't be misused by bad guys in attacks. In today's connected world, cybercriminals want to gain trusted status and remain undetected, which makes keys and certificates a prime target. Unfortunately, most security systems blindly trust keys and certificates, allowing bad guys to use them to hide in encrypted traffic, spoof websites, deploy malware, and steal data. As the Immune System for the Internet, Venafi patrols across the network, on devices, behind the firewall, and throughout the internet to determine which SSL/TLS, SSH, WiFi, VPN and mobile keys and certificates are trusted, protects those that should be trusted, and fixes or blocks those that are not.

As the market-leading cybersecurity company in Next Generation Trust Protection (NGTP) and a Gartner-recognized Cool Vendor, the Venafi Trust Protection Platform™ protects keys and certificates and eliminates blind spots from threats hidden in encrypted traffic. As part of any enterprise infrastructure protection strategy, Venafi TrustAuthority™, Venafi TrustForce™, and Venafi TrustNet™ help organizations know what's trusted and "self" in order to regain control over keys and certificates on mobile devices, applications, virtual machines and network devices and out in the cloud. From stopping certificate-based outages to enabling SSL inspection, Venafi creates an ever-evolving, intelligent response that protects your network, business, and brand. Venafi Threat Center also provides primary research and threat intelligence for attacks on keys and certificates.

Venafi customers are among the world's most demanding, security-conscious Global 5000 organizations in financial services, retail, insurance, healthcare, telecommunications, aerospace, manufacturing, and high tech. Today Venafi protects four of the top five US banks, eight of the top US 10 health insurance companies and four of the top seven US retailers. Venafi is backed by top-tier venture capital funds, including Foundation Capital, Intel Capital, Origin Partners, Pelion Venture Partners, QuestMark Partners, and Silver Lake Waterman. For more information, visit www.venafi.com.

SOURCE Venafi

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