With the CrowdStrike update continuing to cause havoc across the planet, a startup has raised $13.5 million to at least improve some level of security for the kinds of devices that have been affected. California-based ZeroTier raised the Series A in a funding round led by Battery Ventures.
While legacy companies like Cisco or Palo Alto Networks typically secure edge networks, the new vanguard of this sector is considered to be more focused around devices. This is the arena ZeroTier is playing in, and it now claims to support over 3 million connected devices and 600,000 network administrators across more than 230 countries and territories worldwide.
It’s also attracted a former venture investor, Andrew Gault, to lead the company in May this year, to focus on revenue and company growth, after founder Adam Ierymenko transitioned to CTO to focus on its core technology and long-term vision, according to spokesperson Jennefer Traeger. Gault previously co-founded video game streaming platform Gaikai, which sold to Sony for $380 million in 2012, and was the first investor in Oculus VR. He was also a founding partner of 7percent Ventures.
Gault thinks there are not many scalable, vendor-agnostic options available to enterprises today: “I think our niche in the market is much more device-centric, but less servers and laptops, and more routers and sensors. There are 18 billion devices online today, expected to grow to 32 billion by 2030, but secure connectivity is a bit of an unsolved problem. We create secure connections between all these devices and have them just talking away as if they’re on a local network in your office. It’s that space I want to go after,” he told TechCrunch over a call.
ZeroTier’s clients include Metropolis, a company offering checkout-free parking payments.
Bonfire Ventures, Anorak Ventures, Grand Enterprises B.V., Airbridge Equity Partners and First In Ventures also participated in the round.