OnSecurity, a UK-based testing startup, disclosed to QA Financial it has received a fresh capital allocation from Gresham House Ventures, amounting to a total of just over $6 million.
OnSecurity, which provides third-party penetration testing services, said the investment will be used to boost the firm’s growth, expand its pentest platform and invest in R&D.
The firm, which was founded in the English city of Bristol in 2018, where it is still based, said it plans to double its staff headcount from 35 to 70 this year.
Conor O’Neill, CEO of OnSecurity, said the company currently serves around 300 customers and has completed 5,000 pentests to date.
Ultimately, the firm’s mission is to become the world’s leading pentest engagement platform, O’Neill declared.
“This marks an important moment for OnSecurity as we look to further advance our platform’s capabilities and bring our streamlined solutions to more clients,” he said.
Referring to its investor, Gresham House Ventures, O’Neill said the private equity firm “has a fantastic track record of helping to scale up technology-enabled businesses like ours and we are confident that this backing will play a key role in driving the next stage of growth for OnSecurity.”
As part of the investment, Grace Cassy of Gresham House Ventures will join the board as non-executive Chair.
Since OnSecurity’s pentest platform went live in 2018, it has been finetuning its platform that is able to identify and address vulnerabilities in computer systems, networks, and web applications.
“We provide high quality human pentesting services via a platform technology that automates traditionally manual, cumbersome processes such as booking, scheduling and reporting,” O’Neill explained.
“The business has grown rapidly since launch,” he added.
Booming pentest market
The pentest market is significant, with global annual spend estimated at £4bn and growing, driven by the increasing adoption of cloud computing solutions, a proliferation of open-source code usage and significant regulatory drivers.
One particular area of growth is within the financial services sector, where the Digital Operational Resiliency Act (DORA) will require businesses to conduct annual threat-led penetration testing from January of next year.
The deal, led by Benjamin Faulkner and assisted by Francis Ireland, continues a busy period of dealmaking for Gresham House Ventures.
Recent investments this year include a £6.3mn investment into data governance and cyber incident management firms ActiveNav and Actfore, a £10mn investment into event accreditation platform Accredit Solutions and an exit from logistics and warehousing specialist Master Removers Group.
Steve Carle, operating partner at Gresham House Ventures, explains why his firm decided to allocate the funds to OnSecurity.
“They have built a robust and differentiated platform offering in a market that has historically been plagued with manual processes and poor customer experience,” Carle stated.
He said he belives the business is well placed to expand its client base further over the coming years and support businesses and organisations worldwide in the face of new cybersecurity challenges.
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