Recorded Future Bought By Private Equity Firm Insight Partners For $780M
Threat intelligence vendor Recorded Future said it's uniquely positioned to capitalize on opportunities in adjacent markets such as security operations, vulnerability management, and third-party risk.
Minority owner Insight Partners has purchased a controlling stake in Recorded Future for $780 million to accelerate the threat intelligence vendor's technical and product vision.
The Somerville, Mass.-based company said it's uniquely positioned to capitalize on opportunities in adjacent markets such as security operations, vulnerability management, and third-party risk. Recorded Future said it plans to leverage Insight's deep experience and internal consulting arm, Insight Onsite, to accelerate the next phase of the company's global growth and expansion.
"The evolution of our relationship will allow Recorded Future to better serve its current and future clients as we tap into the full potential of our technical roadmap and position our software to truly answer some of the most difficult and unique intelligence challenges faced by our community," Recorded Future Co-Founder and CEO Christopher Ahlberg said in a statement.
[Related: CRN Exclusive: Recorded Future Turns To The Channel To Help Build Integrations With Other Vendors]
Recorded Future was founded in 2009, employs 408 people, and has raised $57.9 million in five rounds of outside equity, according to LinkedIn and CrunchBase. The most recent $25 million Series E round in October 2017 was led by New York City-based Insight, according to CrunchBase. Recorded Future wasn't immediately available for additional comment.
Ahlberg said Recorded Future has been working with Insight Managing Director Mike Triplett and the Insight team for a number of years, and has benefitted from the company's sage advice, industry knowledge, and relationships. Getting bought by Insight was the logical next step for Recorded Future given the opportunities in front of the company, according to Ahlberg.
"This partnership lays the foundation to take our products and software to the next level to best serve our clients, changing the face of our industry as we drive an intelligence-led strategy to help reduce risk and enable business operations for clients around the globe," Ahlberg said in a statement.
Insight's Triplett praised Recorded Future for remaining hyper-focused on providing clients with the threat intelligence needed to understand their environments, manage risk, and combat malicious actors.
"As a market leader, Recorded Future provides its services to the greatest number of large enterprises of any industry competitor, offering the best customer care and highest Net Promoter Score," Insight Vice President Thomas Krane said in a statement.
Insight was founded in 1995, has more than $20 billion of assets under management, and has cumulatively invested in over 300 companies worldwide. In addition to Recorded Future, the private equity firm's current cybersecurity investments include: Armis, Checkmarx, Darktrace, Detectify, FireMon, Tenable, and Thycotic, according to Insight's website.
"Insight's renewed investment in a testament to the vision and direction laid out by Recorded Future's leadership team," Triplett said. "We are thrilled to partner with Recorded Future on this next stage of growth and look forward to what's to come."
Recorded Future launched its Connected partner program in June 2017 to allow VARs to bundle their own solutions with the company's machine learning tool to help organizations automate how they process potential threats. At the time, Recorded Future had 35 VAR partners, 15 MSSPs and 30 technology partners around the world.
Nearly a year later, the company announced plans to tap 10 of its solution provider partners to help construct integrations with software from other security operations, incident response, and vulnerability management vendors. The company said it hoped to grow its new Connect Xchange technology partner community from 14 vendors as of April 2018 to 50 by the end of the year.