Cyber security software company, Panaseer, announced on Thursday it has successfully raised $2.25 million through a syndicated seed investment round. The investors include Albion Ventures, Notion Capital, Winton Technology Ventures, C5 Holdings, and Elixirr.
Panaseer was founded in 2014 by Nik Whitfield and a team of cyber security experts from BAE Systems. It is one of a new wave of UK cyber security start-ups working with commercial enterprises and was selected to accompany Prime Minister David Cameron to Washington DC earlier this year as part of a cyber-security delegation. Panaseer has since signed its first New York-based Financial Services client.
The company has built a platform which analyses the data provided by all the different cyber security solutions and provides a visual interface to drill down into and understand this information, and so inform board-level decisions on the allocation of security budgets or weaknesses in cybersecurity policies. As well as growing a New York client base, Panaseer is currently working with several major UK Financial Services customers. Andy Williams, UK government’s Cyber Envoy to the US stated:
“As one of the new generation of UK cyber start-ups that accompanied the Prime Minister to the US earlier this year, it is great news that Panaseer has now secured its initial US client business and external investment. Panaseer’s application of advanced data science techniques to help secure the enterprise is an excellent example of British cyber innovation with global market potential.”
Stephen Newton, founder and managing partner of Elixirr, explained:
“We are delighted to be a part of this seed investment round. We love to invest in game-changing companies and the insight Panaseer can provide to enterprises is unrivalled. We know from our clients that cyber security is a big topic around the boardroom table at the moment and we are looking forward to seeing Panaseer join these conversations.”
Nik Whitfield, CEO of Panaseer added:
“Recent high profile hacks have shot cyber security to the top of company’s risk concerns and major enterprises are only too aware of the threats they might face from the various hacking groups who target them. The increased awareness of cyber-attacks presents a new problem for those tasked with protecting their organisations and boards are now regularly asking ‘How Secure Are We?’ New Big Data technologies such as the Panaseer Security Data Lake allow us to analyse this cyber-relevant data to produce previously unobtainable insight. We are delighted to have successfully completed this round of investment. We look forward to working closely with our partners and making use of their considerable experience.”
