Press release: Cerby announces Series A

ALAMEDA, Calif., Aug. 22, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Cerby, the comprehensive access management platform for nonstandard applications, today announced that the company has raised $17 million in Series A funding. Two Sigma Ventures led the round with significant participation from Outpost Ventures, an investment platform of Neuberger Berman. Participating investors include Ridge Ventures, Founders Fund, Bowery Capital, AV8, Salesforce Ventures, Tau Ventures, Okta Ventures, Incubate Fund, and Ben Johnson, co-founder of Obsidian Security and Carbon Black.

Cerby received significant inbound interest and preemptive terms sheets due to the unique risk they address in the identity and access management (IAM) market – nonstandard applications. These applications do not support common identity and security standards like APIs, single sign-on (SSO), and protocols for automating employee onboarding and offboarding from critical applications.

A recent study by the Ponemon Institute found that 52% of organizations have experienced a cybersecurity incident caused by their inability to secure nonstandard applications, posing an increasingly challenging risk in every business. This spotlights the growing need for a fully connected identity mesh that works for all applications: on-premises, OT, legacy, and cloud – not just those supporting standards.

"We're honored and deeply grateful for the support from our customers and investors. Their dedication to Cerby is dwarfed only by our commitment to close the growing identity gap that is fueled by the decentralization of work and technology spending," said Belsasar (Bel) Lepe, CEO and co-founder of Cerby. "Our platform is the only one that addresses nonstandard application risk across all deployment scenarios, including cloud, privately hosted, and on-premises. All of which are unsupported by traditional identity and security tools. Cerby's patent-pending access orchestration engine is the first and only to make passwordless authentication an immediate reality for nonstandard applications."

This latest round brings the company's total funding to $32.5 million. The funds will be used to scale Cerby's go-to-market efforts, including expanding sales and marketing efforts; accelerating innovation of Cerby's access management solution for nonstandard applications; further building on customer momentum and industry research; continued investment in generative AI to enhance development speed and maintenance of integrations; and reinforce international teams and customers with additional support.

Founded in 2020, Cerby has evolved from its inception with a focus on managing access to applications for marketing teams to expand its reach to sales, product, financial services, and healthcare applications, catering to public SaaS and privately hosted applications. The investment highlights Cerby's need in the financial services sector, which is often heavily dependent on nonstandard applications. Recent achievements in addition to fundraising include the company becoming Okta partner-approved and filing two patents to advance its IP strategy.

"We are excited to be investing in the exceptional Cerby team. This financing round will help the company further expand its innovative, secure, and user-friendly platform to revolutionize how businesses manage and protect nonstandard and disconnected applications, and further capitalize on the strong momentum and growing interest from customers," said Villi Iltchev, Partner at Two Sigma Ventures. "We look forward to supporting Cerby on their mission to transform how businesses secure and manage access to their critical business applications and infrastructure."

"Companies that challenge the status quo are very attractive to us," said David Dubick, Partner at Outpost Ventures. "Cerby stands at the forefront of a transformation in identity management for nonstandard applications, a domain often overlooked yet critically vital. We're thrilled to partner with the passionate team at Cerby and confident in the tremendous impact they're poised to make."