Highlights –

  • Axio’s market-leading platform, Axio360 assists enterprises in centrally managing their cyber risk posture via cybersecurity assessments, risk quantification, and insurance stress testing.

Cyber risk quantification solutions leader Axio, a SaaS company, announced the raise of a USD 23 million Series B funding round. ISTARI, a Temasek-founded global cybersecurity company that assists clients in constructing cyber resilience, led the round, with participation from other existing investors such as Distributed Ventures, IA Capital Group, and Bob Dudley, Chairman of Axio and former CEO of BP. Axio has received a total of USD 30 million in funding, including a USD 4.5 million Series A round completed in 2018.

Axio will use the funding to further its goal of enabling security and business leaders to identify and address the cyber hazards their firms are most vulnerable to. The recent spike in cyberattacks has brought to light how vulnerable businesses are to financially crippling occurrences like ransomware and highlighted the shortcomings of current approaches to managing cyber risk. Companies must adopt a modern, risk-based strategy when deciding how to manage cyber risk, which depends on their ability to quantify the financial impact of cyber risk.

Scott Kannry, CEO and Co-Founder of Axio, said, “We are ecstatic about securing this Series B investment round that now gives us the means to meet the growing global demand for cyber risk quantification. The attack landscape has demonstrated that old, faith-based strategies that simply layer on controls without a clear understanding of what to prioritize have done little to reduce susceptibility.”

President and Co-Founder David White added, “We started this company to help CISOs understand how they should spend their next dollar, through risk mitigation or risk transfer (insurance). Cyber-attacks will happen, and since hackers are continuously innovating, CISOs need to improve in tandem to ensure cyber resilience.”

Axio’s market-leading platform, Axio360, which was founded in 2016, assists enterprises in centrally managing their cyber risk posture via cybersecurity assessments, risk quantification, and insurance stress testing. Axio has recently witnessed increasing adoption of its solution across industries, concentrating on high-risk businesses in the energy, utilities, and other critical infrastructure sectors.

The following are highlights of Axio’s partner and customer base:

  • Three of the top 10 largest North American utility providers
  • Two of the top five largest oil and gas producers in North America
  • Three trade associations that account for the majority of the continent’s energy grid.

ISTARI will nominate two more directors to the Axio Board of Directors as part of Series B. Mark Malecki, the Chief Technology Officer of ISTARI, and Curt Dalton, the Managing Director of the Americas, will join the Board, which is presided over by Bob Dudley, a former CEO of BP.

Bob Dudley said, “I’m delighted to welcome ISTARI to the Axio team, and I look forward to Axio’s continued global expansion. I joined Axio last year because I fundamentally believe in its mission to provide an easier and more accessible way for security and business leaders to align on a single source of truth around corporate cyber exposure. Boards require deeper and continuous visibility into the state of cyber organizational readiness to ensure that investments and initiatives are properly aligned to broader risk reduction efforts. They are on the hook when a breach happens, and far too often, Board oversight of corporate cyber risk gets lost in the technical details. Axio helps security and business leaders speak a common language centered on the financial impact of risk.”

ISTARI Chief Portfolio Officer, Amit Jasuja, commented: “We are thrilled that Axio is joining the ISTARI Collective and believe the partnership will help expedite its reach and differentiate its capabilities. We invested in Axio because we immediately recognized that the platform would benefit our clients and complement the other companies in our portfolio. Organizations need a way to evaluate their cyber risk and make decisions from a business and financial perspective. Axio is a powerful tool for that.”