Vectra plans to ramp up operations with $100m investment

AI security vendor will use cash to accelerate global expansion

Security vendor Vectra has closed a successful Series E investment round with $100m (£78.6m) in funding.

The round was led by private equity house TCV, which also counts the likes of Webroot, Splunk and Datto among its investment companies.

Vectra was founded in 2010 and uses artificial intelligence (AI) to detect threats that go unnoticed in a network.

Its most recent round brings its total funding to $222.5m, according to Crunchbase.

The vendor will use the capital to speed up its global market expansion and its R&D, as well as strengthening its Cognito platform, which it claims detects attackers in real time and provides a conclusive chain of evidence of cyberattacks.

"The cloud has inherent security blind spots, making it imperative to eliminate cyber-risks as enterprises move their business to the cloud," said Hitesh Sheth, CEO of Vectra.

"The Cognito platform enables them to stop hidden cyberattacks in the cloud. We look forward to partnering with TCV and our existing investors as we continue our rapid growth."

The company claimed it had seen 104 per cent growth in annual recurring revenue between 2017 and 2018 and stated that it would continue to implement initiatives that address the worldwide deficit in cloud security, as well as developing its existing platform and expanding its customer base.

Tim McAdam, general partner at TCV, stated: "TCV has an extensive track record of partnering with enterprise security companies, including Rapid7 and Splunk, from growth stage to public.

"In our research on the category, it became clear to us that Vectra was rapidly gaining momentum with customers by rethinking the way enterprises view both network and cloud security.

"The Vectra Cognito platform is poised to become requisite in the security infrastructure of multinational enterprises and mid-size businesses alike."