In what Axonius says could be its last funding round before a public listing, the cybersecurity startup has raised $200 million from investors at a valuation of $2.6 billion.
In an interview with Reuters, Axonius CEO Dean Sysman declined to share an exact time frame but said the company could be ready for an IPO within two years.
"The reason we did this funding round was more than anything starting to execute as a future public company and bringing on board to the cap table the investors that see things that way and help us to transform on that milestone,” said Sysman, who co-founded the company in 2017.
This latest funding round, which increases the total raised by the firm to nearly $400 million, was led by venture capital firm Accel, with participation from Silver Lake Waterman, Alta Park Capital, Owl Rock, Bessemer Venture Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Alkeon, Stripes, ICONIQ, and DTCP.
Axonius became a cybersecurity unicorn last year after raising $100 million in Series D funding.
New York-based Axonius has developed a platform that provides cybersecurity asset management, SaaS management, cyber asset attack surface management (CAASM), cyber asset inventory, cloud asset compliance, and policy enforcement capabilities. The platform helps companies identify potential security risks by analyzing information technology assets from devices to services.
The switch to remote working during the pandemic caused many companies to ramp up spending on cybersecurity solutions, which benefited companies like Axonius a great deal.
Axonius says its solutions are used by hundreds of companies worldwide, including government agencies and Fortune 500 firms.
“Axonius has transformed the way companies manage and secure their assets, solving foundational problems for teams struggling to control complexity,” said Matt Weigand, Partner at Accel. “Axonius has achieved tremendous growth in such a short time, and we believe that their deep understanding of IT and security challenges have positioned them to be the system of record for all infrastructure.”
Axonius said its annual recurring revenue has tripled in the past three consecutive years as more companies started using its cybersecurity offerings.
