Corelight Secures $75M Series D Funding - Network Defense

Corelight Secures $75 Million in Series D Funding

Corelight, a San Francisco-based company specializing in open network detection and response (NDR) platforms, has successfully closed a $75 million Series D funding round. The investment was spearheaded by Energy Impact Partners.

Investment Details and Company History

This funding round included participation from Capital One Ventures, the Crowdstrike Falcon Fund, and Gaingels. With this latest injection of capital, Corelight’s total funding now reaches $160 million.

Previous funding rounds include a $50 million Series C in October 2019, a $25 million Series B in September 2018, and a $9.2 million Series A round completed in July 2017.

Future Growth Plans

Despite substantial prior investment, Corelight does not foresee an immediate exit. Brian Dye, Corelight’s CEO, communicated to TechCrunch that the company intends to reinvest in growth initiatives.

He stated that, considering the significant market opportunity and the company’s performance as a rapidly expanding NDR provider, further capital raises are anticipated in the future.

“Predicting the optimal timing for a public listing is challenging,” Dye explained. “We currently find the private markets appealing and expect to remain a private entity for the next two years, reassessing market conditions before determining our subsequent course of action.”

The newly acquired funds will be allocated to accelerating global market expansion and the development of innovative data and cloud-based solutions.

Dye further emphasized, “Beyond expanding our market reach, we are committed to ensuring our insights remain industry-leading and are easily accessible to a diverse customer base.”

Competitive Landscape and Founding Principles

Corelight operates in a competitive market alongside companies like FireEye and McAfee (owned by STG). The company was established in 2013.

Its origins lie in a collaboration between Dr. Vern Paxson, a computer science professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and Robin Sommer and Seth Hall, who sought to create a network visibility solution built upon the open-source framework Zeek (formerly known as Bro).

The Zeek Foundation

Dr. Paxson initially began developing Zeek in 1995 while at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL).

Today, Zeek is widely recognized as a premier standard for both network security monitoring and network traffic analysis. It has been implemented by numerous organizations globally.

These include the U.S. Department of Energy, various U.S. government agencies, and prominent research institutions such as Indiana University, Ohio State University, and Stanford University.