Grotech Ventures has joined a $30 million Series B funding round for ThreatX, a Boston, Mass.-based cyber security firm. Harbert Growth Partners, with offices in Richmond, Va., led the round, with participation from Vistara Growth and other existing investors — .406 Ventures and Access Venture Partners.
Subsequent to its investment, Harbert’s general partner Tom Robertswill join ThreatX’s board.So far, ThreatX has raised $51.6 million in venture funding as it builds systems to protect APIs, or application programming interfaces, from varied threats including distributed denial-of-service attacks and ransomware.
“The ThreatX platform delivers the one-two punch that modern organizations seek in API and web application protection by incorporating behavioral analytics and multiple detection methods within a single analytics engine,” said ThreatX CEO Gene Fay. “This funding will enable us to accelerate development of our platform’s capabilities and expand our global go-to-market strategy.”
Tech Is Grotech’s Focus
Grotech Ventures, founded in 1984, is one of the oldest venture firms in the country, notably in the Baltimore region. It eyes opportunities to invest between $500,000 and $5 million in cyber security, fintech, supply chain, logistics and software startups.
So far, Grotech has raised over $225 million, made over 150 portfolio investments and over 40 exits. Grotech’s other portfolio investments this year are: SturdyAI, EcoMap Technologies, Shard Secure, Sunstone Credit, Apkudo, Yardstik, Krista Software and FactoryFix. It also had three exits this year — Perishable Shipping Solutions, of Youngstown, Ohio; Urjanet, of Atlanta, Ga.; and Youreka, of Baltimore.
Lawson DeVries, a 17-year veteran, serves as Grotech’s managing general partner since 2020. He has focused on investments in software and tech-enabled services companies. He was the first investor in NexGen Storage (acquired by Fusion-io) and has been closely associated with a number of Grotech portfolio companies including Log Rhythm (acquired by Thoma Bravo), Logi Analytics (acquired by Marlin Equity), BroadSoft (acquired by Cisco), and Collective Intellect (acquired by Oracle). DeVries sits on the boards of Apkudo, Ceros and CrowdStreet.
DeVries started his career with equity research at Deutsche Bank, and later managed sales at Buckingham Research Group. He has a BA in English literature from Harvard University and an MBA from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.
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Ahead of Rivals
ThreatX claims several advantages over existing security products for APIs. For example, it not only identifies potential vulnerabilities but also provides solutions, some in real-time. It also warns of things like excessive data exposure.
“ThreatX can recognize attacker behavior indicative of an attempt to exploit excessive data exposure, then flag and watch that user,” wrote Brett Settle in Security Boulevard. “This real-time monitoring enables ThreatX to execute advanced threat engagement techniques, such as IP interrogation, fingerprinting, and tar pitting.”
