Silverfort, the Israeli/American startup, takes a holistic view when it comes to identity security in an organization. When it comes to potential breaches, people, machines, clouds, and applications old and new can be targets, and they can be exploited at any of the many points at which they interact with each other. So the best way to protect against malicious exploits is to secure identity authentication between all of these programs.
This hypothesis has been proven and tested by businesses, and the startup says it is currently signing them up as customers at a rate of 100 per quarter. Meanwhile, revenue grows 100% annually with the annual return rate reaching tens of millions of dollars. All of this caught the attention of investors, and now Silverfort has raised $116 million to expand at what reliable sources tell me is “about” a $1 billion valuation.
“We think we can really be that focused identity security layer that covers all the silos,” CEO and co-founder Hed Kowitz said in an interview.
The all-equity round is led by Brighton Park Capital, with participation from previous backers – a mix of strategic and financial investors. These companies include Acro Capital, Greenfield Partners, Citi Ventures, General Motors Ventures, Maor Investments, Vintage Investment Partners, and Singtel Innov8.
As those familiar with security technology know, space can be divided into many different areas and methods. Identity has emerged as one of the most interesting of these areas in recent years, not least because of the growth of cloud architecture, which has made it possible to build not only more business software and applications, but also entirely new frontiers of interaction between those who are different. Products to make them and workers more dynamic and productive.
Each point of interaction essentially involves authentication between applications and here lies the challenge: each of these can become a potential security vulnerability. Given that much authentication is automated, and that vulnerabilities can be inadvertently created by even the most innocent code ship, this creates a large attack surface and is difficult to monitor.
Ironically, the most transformative technologies are often the products that are easily used and require little from users to operate. This is somewhat the case with Silverfort, which is designed to work with any existing ID management products an organization may already be using. Silverfort essentially fits into these, taking a snapshot of the larger network, covering not just workers but devices and applications, and then providing monitoring around the larger landscape, tracking and responding to unusual activity, specifically Threat Detection and Response (ITDR). and Identity Threat Prevention (ITP) capabilities.
As we described earlier, the goal is not to build another ID platform to replace or compete with Okta or anything else. It is “sitting behind all the other platforms,” as Kovitz puts it.
“We believe the market is creating a disconnect between identity infrastructure and identity security, and we want to be the market leader in security,” he said in an interview this month.
Other platforms work, or integrate, by forwarding authentication alerts to Silverfort, which then provides a “second opinion” in authenticating a user or device. The comprehensive approach also, crucially, covers legacy applications and endpoints, a hard truth of the promise of “digital transformation”: most companies will not tear down legacy systems and devices, but rather replace them over time.
“Silverfort is one of the rare companies that has successfully envisioned how a large market would need to transform to solve a difficult problem — in this case, identity security,” Mike Gregoire, a partner at Brighton Park Capital, said in a statement. “The company has a proven track record of building innovative products at scale that exceed customer expectations, coupled with excellent market execution. Silverfort’s deep market experience and insight into the identity security market, as well as its ability to build a winning team and culture, is unparalleled.” Gregoire is CEO Formerly of CA Technologies and Taleo, he will join Silverfort’s board of directors in this round.