Darktrace is a U.K.-based cyber defense firm whose proprietary technology sits on customer networks and uses machine learning to identify and stop malicious behavior. Its product is deployed on more than 7,000 networks and it counts customers including London Gatwick Airport, AIG, and the Science Museum Group. Since a $75 million Series D injection a year ago, the company says it has more than doubled deployments. Darktrace recently raised $50 million in a Series E that values the company at $1.65 billion. The company said the funding will drive further international expansion and support efforts to combat AI-based attacks. Headcount has increased by more than half and Darktrace has opened eight new offices, including Los Angeles and an expanded Singapore office, to meet growing demand. Darktrace builds an "Enterprise Immune System" appliance that sits on a company’s network, uses machine learning to identify malicious activity, alerts IT managers, and can take immediate action to stop or slow attacks. The company reports a total contract value of $200 million, 3,000 global customers, and 140% growth in the last year. Darktrace says it will use the new funding to expand business operations into more markets, including deeper expansion across Latin America and Asia Pacific. It has entered a strategic partnership with Hong Kong-based CITIC Telecom CPC to bring its technology to Asia Pacific (CITIC is a partner and customer, not an investor). Darktrace works with telcos such as BT and Telstra and is backed by investors including Autonomy founder Mike Lynch. Darktrace’s core product combines a box that sits on a company’s network with software that analyzes traffic using advanced mathematics and machine learning to distinguish normal from malicious activity. The system alerts IT managers to suspicious behavior and can take automated actions (for example throttling network speed) to slow or stop attacks. The company is developing technology to respond to human-written and emerging machine-learning-based attacks and emphasizes automation for rapid threats and ML for stealthy activity. Management says the backing will be used for further international expansion and research and development. The startup claims more than 1,000 customer deployments and reports revenue growth of more than 600% in the last year, translating to millions per month. Investors and early backers in the company include Invoke Capital and Hoxton Ventures, among others. Darktrace offers an enterprise immune system cyber‑defense platform developed out of the University of Cambridge that analyzes network activity and learns the behavior of every device, user and network to detect abnormal threat behaviors. The platform is positioned to protect enterprises and government bodies from advanced attacks and internal data compromises. The company serves customers across multiple verticals including energy and utilities, financial services, telecommunications, healthcare, manufacturing, retail and transportation. Darktrace plans to use the new funding to expand adoption—particularly in the United States and Asia Pacific—scale the business and hire technology, cyber analyst and commercial talent worldwide. The company was founded in 2013 and is based in Cambridge, UK and San Francisco, CA, with offices in Dallas, London, Milan, Melbourne, New York, Paris, Singapore, Toronto and Washington D.C. The Series B proceeds strengthen its go‑to‑market and product scaling efforts. Darktrace builds an 'Enterprise Immune System' based on new mathematics and machine learning developed at the University of Cambridge to learn normal network behaviour and detect subtle deviations in real time. Its product is delivered as a hardware box that sits on a network combined with software that analyses traffic, alerts IT managers to suspicious behaviour, and issues a regular 'Threat Intelligence Report'. The UK-based startup, founded in late 2013, says it addresses advanced insider and external cyber threats that rule-based systems miss. It claims rapid customer growth and counts Virgin Trains, BT and Drax among its customers. Darktrace is backed by Invoke Capital and other investors and reports rapid expansion plans, including moving into the Asia Pacific market. The company recently raised $18 million at an $80 million valuation.

Total raised

$231M

Funding rounds

5

Latest round

Series E

Latest activity

Sep 2018