With the news being dominated by the coronavirus pandemic here are the 16 RegTech deals you may have missed in March.
While businesses are heading into tough times over the coming months, they are still getting things completed and closing funding rounds, which will be vital in helping them survive the current crisis. Investments this month ranged in size from the $320m raised from Tierpoint to $750,000 secured by Attila Security. There were also a number of companies opting for a series extension as opposed to closing a whole new round.
Sepio Systems
The rouge device mitigation solution provider Sepio Systems closed its latest investment round on $4m. Munich Re Ventures led the startup’s new round, which came just months after it secured $6.5m in its Series A. Other contributions came from Hanaco Ventures.
The Sepio Prime solution gives security teams full visibility into their hardware assets and their behaviour in real-time. The startup offers an end-to-end solution which detects and mitigates hardware-based attacks, rogue peripherals, invisible network devices and manipulated firmware.
With the fresh funds, the company is looking to bolster its European expansion efforts.
VoxSmart
VoxSmart, a communication monitoring company, secured a £5.5m investment from UK bank NatWest as it looks to reach new markets. Additionally, the startup will use funds to accelerate the development of the development of new solutions.
The RegTech company ensures banks and financial institutions can maintain communication monitoring requirements through voice and electronic communication services. The service also enables companies to keep to standards while using mobile phones. As the coronavirus is forcing people to work from home, communication monitoring tools for mobile phones will be very useful for firms trying to maintain compliance.
Earlier in the month, the European Securities and Markets Authority relaxed video communication monitoring requirements under MiFID II during the pandemic. During this period it understands firms may encounter scenarios where they cannot record certain conversations, and is asking them to seek alternative measures to mitigate risks.
Stellar Cyber
Stellar Cyber was one of the many cybersecurity companies to close a round during March. The RegTech company bagged a $7.1m extension to its Series A round, adding to the $13.2m it raised in February 2019. The company opted for an extension rather than a new round due to it being a “more efficient way of absorbing capital.”
The additional capital was supplied by Susquehanna International Group, who joins the previous series A investors Valley Capital Partners, Big Basin Ventures, and Northern Light Venture Capital. The new funds are being used to increase research and development efforts, grow sales and marketing initiatives, establish new partnerships and increase its global delivery capabilities.
Hyperproof
Hyperproof proved popular with angel investors after 15 unnamed backers deployed a total of $3m into the startup. The company empowers compliance teams to collect evidence and collaborate with stakeholders to keep compliance controls up-to-date, collating everything into a single dashboard to streamline compliance audits.
In tandem with the funding round, Hyperproof released a new service which helps teams cope with working from home during these coming months The new remote assessment capabilities integrates with video-conferencing services, including Zoom, and enables them to collaborate on their compliance programs, controls and evidence, remotely.
TierPoint
Connected data centre and cloud solution provider TierPoint closed a $320m preferred equity round this month. Its fresh funds will be used to repay its second lien credit facility in full, reduce its balance outstanding under its credit facility and foster growth of the platform.
Argo Infrastructure Partners, Wafra, Macquarie Capital Principal Finance led the investment. With additional support came from Cequel III, Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, RedBird Capital Partners, The Stephens Group and Thompson Street Capital Partners.
The cybersecurity company mitigates online risks via encryption, web application firewalls and DDoS mitigation.
Arkose Labs
Arkose Labs, which helps businesses prevent digital fraud and abuse, closed its Series B round on $22m. The investment was backed by venture capital firms M12 and U.S. Venture Partners, as well as payments giant Paypal.
With the boost to its equity, the RegTech startup is looking to increase its product development, make new hires and increase global expansion efforts.
The company’s funding round came after it saw significant growth, which included it nearly doubling its customer base in a matter of months. Its platform claims to be different from others by cutting fraud off at the source by making cybercriminals expend massive effort to conduct their attacks.
SecuLetter
SecuLetter increased its valuation to $38m after it closed an extension to its Series B round bringing the total capital raised to $8m. The new investment was a $2m capital injection from UTC Investment and added to the $6m raised from Riyadh Valley Company, the Korea Development Bank and Korea Investment Partners back in November 2019.
The company develops and provides products which detect, diagnose, analyse and block malicious code attacks which are tough to detect.
The South Korean RegTech closed the round in a bid to support its global expansion efforts. Additional uses for the equity include growing its product line-up, boosting its R&D capabilities, developing more enhanced products which leverage AI-backed malware detection and content disarm and reconstruction software.
Attila Security
Attila Security, a network and data security service, secured $750,000 in its Series A funding, which was led by Maryland Venture Fund. Other commitments to the round came from Bull City Venture Partners and Blu Venture Investors. The company was founded in 2018 with the goal of helping businesses protect their data and networks. It achieves this through its VPN firewall security system which combats threats to physical, virtual and cloud applications
Eigen Technologies
Eigen Technologies was another RegTech which decided to extend a former round rather than raise a new one. The RegTech company bagged an additional $5m in capital from ING Ventures.
The startup previously raised $37m it collected in November last year from Lakestar, Dawn Capital, Temasek and Goldman Sachs Growth Equity. Its support from ING Ventures was part of a wider strategic partnership which sees the pair work together to boost the use of natural language processing technology to areas including trade finance and SME banking.
Eigen Technologies improves decision making by automatically extracting data from documents and other text sources. Its use cases include bank optimisation, LIBOR repapering, asset-backed securities analysis, portfolio origination and regulatory compliance.
Right-Hand
Singapore-based Right-Hand collected $1m in its seed funding stage this month. The equity round was led by Atlas Ventures, with contributions also coming from SGInnovate and Entrepreneur First. With the fresh funds, the cybersecurity startup is hoping to increase its product development.
The company builds software which enables teams to monitor, measure and mitigate employee-induced cyber risks in real-time. Cybersecurity training and education is available through Right-Hand, which leverage gamification and customised modules to ensure teams are prepared for digital threats.
Arctic Wolf
Security operations centre Arctic Wolf aims to continue the 130% growth in customers it saw in 2019 through the support of its new $60m Series D. Blue Cloud Ventures and Stereo Capital acted as the lead investors of the round, with contributions also coming from Delta-v Capital and NextEquity Partners.
Plans for the new capital include releasing new services, entering new markets, and bolstering its position within the managed detection and response market.
Mailprotector
Email security company Mailprotector netted $5m in a growth equity round from Ballast Point Ventures. Plans for the capital include product development, bolstering sales and marketing efforts and expanding services to clients. Furthermore, the RegTech company is looking to hire an additional 30 staff members. The startup offers a cloud-based email security, compliance, encryption and hosting platform which helps businesses safeguard their emails.
Perimeter 81
Perimeter 81, a zero-trust secure network, also extended its Series A round this month, adding an additional $4.5m. The fresh funding was led by Toba Capital, with other investments coming from previous unnamed backers.
The cybersecurity company closed its initial Series A round last year, but the exact amount raised was not disclosed. However, Perimeter 81 did state that following the close of the new $4.5m round, it has raised a total of $19.2m in the past 12 months.
ShardSecure
ShardSecure, a data protection startup, closed its oversubscribed seed funding round on an undisclosed amount. The capital was raised to support the launch of its solution later this year. The round was backed by Industrifonden, SineWave Ventures, Tom Noonan, 500 Startups and other unnamed backers.
In line with its planned launch, the company is using the new equity to grow its sales and marketing team and strengthen its development team. The ShardSecure solution gives businesses a tool to store and share sensitive data in the cloud, while keeping it protected from hackers.
OpsCompass
OpsCompass, a multi-cloud governance and compliance provider, netted $6.78m in its Series A as it looks to accelerate its product development. Other plans for the capital include scaling its go-to-market capabilities and leverage new trends and market demands.
Elsewhere Partners led this investment, with Dundee Venture Capital, Invest Nebraska, M25, Nelnet and Nebraska Angels also contributing.
The RegTech offers a software-as-a-service solution which gives real-time actionable insights for compliance, security and cost management. The company has three core products: compliance analysis, cost anticipation and security posture.
Horangi
Singapore-based cybersecurity company Horangi scored $20m in its Series B round as it prepares to boost its Southeast Asia expansion efforts. The round was led by private equity firm Provident Growth. Other contributors included Monk’s Hill Ventures, Right Click Capital and Genesis Alternative Ventures.
In addition to expansion efforts, the fresh equity is being used to enhance its cloud security platform Warden, by integrating AI and machine learning technologies to help organisations stay ahead of advanced threats. The startup will also be using the money to double the staff head count and bolster its presence in Singapore and Indonesia.
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