Cape Privacy Secures $20 Million in Series A Funding

Cape Privacy, a startup focused on facilitating secure and encrypted data sharing for businesses, has announced the completion of a $20 million Series A funding round.

Investment Details

Evolution Equity Partners spearheaded the investment, with contributions from Tiger Global Management, Ridgeline Partners, and Downing Lane as new investors.

Existing investors, including Boldstart Ventures, Version One Ventures, Haystack, and Radical Ventures, alongside various individual investors, also participated in this funding round.

To date, the company has raised approximately $25 million, building upon a $5 million seed investment secured last June.

Product Evolution and Core Technology

According to Cape Privacy CEO Ché Wijesinghe, the company’s product has undergone significant development since its initial launch.

“Our primary focus has been on encrypted learning, the foundational technology enabling secure multi-party computation,” Wijesinghe explained. “This allows organizations or departments to collaborate and construct machine learning models utilizing encrypted data.”

Key Business Application

A prominent use case involves a retail company, under private equity ownership, securely sharing data with a major financial services firm.

This data is then leveraged to enhance the financial institution’s machine learning models, with data security being paramount – a core value proposition of Cape Privacy.

Data Governance and Compliance

Beyond data sharing, the company incorporates data governance and compliance features.

These components ensure that data sharing practices adhere to both internal policies and external regulations pertaining to the data type.

Expanding Market Opportunities

While currently concentrating on the financial services sector, due to Wijesinghe’s established network, the company envisions applications extending far beyond this single industry.

Potential sectors include pharmaceuticals, government, healthcare, telecommunications, and manufacturing.

“The need for this technology is universal,” Wijesinghe stated. “Cape’s encrypted learning has the potential to be as transformative to data security as SSL was to the adoption of the web browser.”

Investor Perspective

Richard Seewald, founding and managing partner at Evolution Equity Partners, highlighted the product’s scalability.

“The initial application in Financial Services is just the beginning,” Seewald noted. “Cape has ambitious plans in life sciences and government, where machine learning can drive significant advancements in areas like clinical trials and counter-terrorism. We foresee widespread adoption of Cape’s technology across numerous industries and applications.”

Commitment to Diversity and Inclusion

The company has grown to a team of 20 and demonstrates a strong commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI).

“We are very deliberate in our DEI efforts,” Wijesinghe emphasized. “We foster a culture of acceptance, encompassing diversity in color, race, gender, and beyond – we recently welcomed our first nonbinary employee.”

Fostering an Inclusive Workplace

To promote inclusivity, the company provides training to enhance employees’ understanding of cultural differences.

The team is geographically diverse, with members spanning 10 different time zones.

Future Collaboration

Currently operating as a remote organization, Cape Privacy plans to establish New York City as a central hub for occasional in-person gatherings once pandemic conditions allow.

This will facilitate collaboration among team members from around the globe.