Virtru Recently Raised $60 Million In Growth Financing

By Annie Baker • Feb 9, 2022
  • Virtru recently announced it raised $60 million in growth financing. These are the details.

Virtru — a leader in data protection and inventor of the open TDF standard — recently announced that it has raised $60 million in growth financing co-led by existing investor ICONIQ Growth and new investor Foundry Capital. And other participants in the round include Tiger Global, MC2, Bessemer Venture Partners, and New Enterprise Associates. Michael Chertoff, former Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and co-founder and executive chairman of MC2, and Jon Ein, CEO of Foundry Capital, will join Virtru’s board of directors.

WIth this funding round, Virtru will accelerate the delivery of new products across its data protection portfolio and continue to scale with hiring across sales and marketing, research and development, and customer success. To support these growth plans, Matt Howard, former CMO of Sonatype, has joined Virtru as CMO.

The interest in Zero Trust data protection (ZTDP) has surged over the past several years due to increases in the number and sophistication of cyber attacks; new risks posed by remote work; and recognition that perimeter-based security strategies are insufficient in a cloud-native world. Now over 7,000 organizations use Virtru to safeguard and encrypt their most sensitive data as it flows in and out of email and file-sharing platforms, SaaS applications, and cloud environments. Virtru’s data protection solutions are built on top of the Trusted Data Format (TDF), the leading data control standard for the U.S. intelligence community and widely recognized as the gold standard for persistent and policy-based data governance.

KEY QUOTES:

“An effective Zero Trust architecture requires cybersecurity professionals to embrace a fundamentally different mindset, one that’s much less about defending porous perimeters and much more about protecting sensitive data. Today, our innovative products enable businesses to easily respect and protect the flow of sensitive data. This latest round of investment is not only a testament to our progress thus far, but also reflects the massive opportunity to establish TDF as the open standard for Zero Trust data protection.”

— John Ackerly, CEO of Virtru

“We originally invested in Virtru because we believed that the TDF was one of the most innovative approaches to protecting sensitive data flowing through enterprise workflows. Fast forward to today, and Virtru has now protected more than 1 billion digital assets. This latest investment reflects our strong belief that the company is well-positioned to serve as the data-centric policy control plane for all things Zero Trust.”

— Will Griffith, founding partner at ICONIQ Growth

“We have been tracking Virtru for years and are fortunate to become a shareholder at a time when the need for the company’s products has never been more urgent. Corporations and governments are generating and sharing unprecedented levels of sensitive data, and Virtru is the most powerful and user-friendly platform to protect and control that data wherever it goes. We are excited to partner with John and his team as they continue to scale the business and fulfill their important data security mission.”

— Jon Ein, CEO of Foundry Capital

“I believe the first principle of security is to protect data and prevent breaches. That said, many of our clients are struggling to prepare for and build capabilities necessary to navigate today’s complex threat environment, especially as it relates to data. We have been working closely with Virtru and see a massive opportunity for TDF in government, especially in fostering secure collaboration with mission partners.”

— Michael Chertoff, former Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security

“Virtru’s mission from day one was to deliver Zero Trust protection with an elegant, frictionless product. As their lead Seed and Series A investor, it’s gratifying to see the market validate Virtru’s unwavering commitment to a seamless user experience.”

— Bessemer partner David Cowan