Startup Confer Raises $17M to Bolster Enterprise Endpoint Security

The security space is a busy area for startup funding, and Boston-based Confer is one of the latest fledging firms to attract investment. The company has secured new funding for its flagship security technology that provides endpoint detection and response (EDR) against sophisticated malware.

Confer has secured $17 million in Series B financing led by Foundation Capital and joined by existing investors Matrix Partners and North Bridge Venture Partners, the company said in a press release. The company said it will use the funding to expand its customer base and activity in the enterprise security market.

The new funding round brings Confer’s total venture capital investment to $25 million. Matrix and North Bridge already invested $8 million in the company in a Series A financing round in January 2014.

Confer’s technology enables customers to proactively detect, prevent and investigate attacks on the endpoint with a user-friendly, integrated solution that combines a sensor with a cloud-based behavioral analytics engine, the company said.

The lightweight sensor monitors the host for the specific tactics, techniques and procedures that are commonly used by attackers. It then passes on that information to Confer’s cloud-based dynamic behavioral analysis engine that can detect more than 99 percent of attacks against the endpoint, according to Confer.

The company said its technology differs from other EDR solutions, which mainly detect threats only. Confer’s solution, on the other hand, can block some behaviors and prevent or disrupt an attack before information is lost or damaged.

Aditya Singh, a partner with Foundation Capital, said it was this differentiator that inspired his company to invest in Confer over other firms with similar technology.

“After researching the endpoint security space extensively, I’m convinced that customers are looking for an easy, lightweight, but comprehensive solution—one that prevents attacks and enables incident response—for protecting employees on all their devices,” he said in the press release. “The other EDR vendors we looked at were too narrow. Confer is the only company we have seen that has the breadth of features combined with proven traction within large-scale production environments.”

Confer CEO Mark Quinlivan said Confer’s technology also can scale, suiting small businesses as well as enterprises. He said customers have responded well to the company’s technology and strategy in 2015. Its customer base today ranges from companies with 100 endpoints to enterprises that need protection for more than 100,000 endpoints and servers.

The new customers added by Confer have driven its revenue growth significantly. Since 2014, the company has achieved a 2,400 percent growth in revenue, with production deployments across a variety of verticals including technology, retail, finance, pharmaceuticals, energy and communications. Confer also continues to steadily increase its employee base; its headcount has doubled since 2014, the company said.