RedOwl Secures $17 Million to Deliver Behavioral Analytics and Insider Risk Management to the Enterprise
Allegis Capital Managing Director Robert Ackerman Appointed to Company’s Board of Directors
San Francisco, CA, July 13, 2015 – RedOwl, a leader in insider risk management and security analytics, today announced it has raised $17 million in Series B funding led by Allegis Capital. The company will use the new funds to continue its expansion, further build out the product development and data science teams, and begin broadening its go-to-market efforts. Reveal, RedOwl’s flagship software program for insider risk management, is deployed across multiple verticals and used within many Fortune 500 companies including Blackstone and K2 Intelligence.
This announcement follows a year of exceptional growth for RedOwl, during which the company nearly doubled its team by adding new data scientists and security engineers, and expanded internationally into London. The Series B round includes participation from Blackstone as an investor, as well as previous angel investors including Salesforce Chairman and CEO Marc Benioff, bringing the total funding amount raised to nearly $30 million.
RedOwl also announced today that Robert Ackerman, founder and managing director of Allegis Capital, has joined the company’s Board of Directors, further validating that RedOwl’s human-centric approach is necessary in addressing today’s advanced cyber threats. Existing Board members include Jay Leek, chief information security officer (CISO) of The Blackstone Group, and Elad Yoran, CEO and founder of Security Growth Partners, and a former advisor to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the FBI’s Information Technology Advisory Council.
“In 2014, as part of Blackstone’s overall security strategy, we set out to tackle the growing concern around insider threats. We reviewed over 15 different insider threat vendors and ultimately landed on RedOwl for many reasons; most importantly, the company was able to monitor disparate and multiple sets of unstructured data that were being overlooked by other insider threat solutions,” said Jay Leek, the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) of Blackstone. “After bringing them on board to help secure Blackstone we realized that they provided many insights and had a unique value proposition which quickly led us to become a customer, followed shortly by us pursuing an investment in their organization. RedOwl has the potential to truly change the way we think about insider threats and security, focused on moving beyond the perimeter to securing the human-side of an organization.”
Intelligence-based Approach
A U.S. Army veteran who spent years working in military intelligence in Iraq and Afghanistan, RedOwl founder and CEO Guy Filippelli recognized parallels between the needs of large enterprises and his work developing first-of-its-kind data analytics software to provide commanders on the battlefield with vital information to make the most informed tactical decisions about the military’s biggest asset—people. Upon leaving the Army, Filippelli decided to extend that vision to building software that would give enterprise security the power of “situational awareness.” Rather than relying on one channel or data source, large companies in highly sensitive industries like financial services, healthcare and government use RedOwl’s software to understand what is happening at the human layer of the business and better manage risk via a multi-dimensional view across disparate data sources.
Through its unique human-centric approach to security, RedOwl allows companies to protect the increasing volumes of sensitive data now being generated and used by employees across the organization by identifying and analyzing changes, patterns and anomalies in user behavior. Companies use RedOwl to draw from multiple data sources in order to visualize what is happening at the human layer of the business, identify suspicious or risky behavior in real-time, and proactively identify where unforeseen risks reside within an organization.
“Organizations are responsible for the safety of the data they generate and collect, but each employee with access represents another layer of risk to the organization, be it through behavior that is careless, malicious or sloppy,” said Filippelli. “Our proprietary behavioral analytics software provides visibility into the human layer of the business, giving enterprise security teams the ability to identify patterns across disparate data streams and create actionable, situational intelligence that drives informed business decisions in real-time.”
Diverse Experience Across the Board
With the addition of Robert Ackerman, RedOwl’s board now includes leading security investors, seasoned industry experts who have developed and grown successful enterprise technology businesses and strategic advisors who understand that the company’s unique human-centric approach to security has the ability to change how their industries manage risk.
“Given that between 70 and 80 percent of cyber attacks have an internal component, the enterprise needs to shift its attention away from the perimeter and focus on monitoring insider risk. As Allegis Capital increases its investment in cutting edge security teams, RedOwl stood out as a company addressing a critical piece of the security puzzle—the people,” said Robert Ackerman, founder and managing director of Allegis Capital, which recently secured a $100 million fund to invest in additional cybersecurity ventures. “RedOwl has an experienced executive team that is approaching insider risk in an entirely new way, whether it’s an employee with malicious intent, a compromised employee or someone that is simply acting carelessly. We’ve been investing in the security analytics space for many years and RedOwl is ahead of the pack—they provide immediate value to companies of all sizes across all verticals, and we look forward to seeing them change the way the enterprise thinks about security.”
About RedOwl
RedOwl offers a cutting-edge analytical solution to security, compliance, and investigative use cases. RedOwl’s flagship product, Reveal, provides immediate value to forward-leaning organizations that understand the massive potential of their untapped internal data sources in improving oversight and reducing risk. For more information, visit www.redowlanalytics.com.
About Allegis Capital
Allegis Capital is a seed and early-stage venture capital investor in companies building disruptive and innovative cyber security solutions for the global digital economy. Founded in 1996, the firm has more than $700 million in capital under management and has been active in cyber security investing since 2000. For more information, visit www.allegiscap.com
Media Contact
Danny Schwartz
RedOwl
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410.528.8397