Shift5 closes $75M Series C round
Gettyimages.com / Andriy Onufriyenko
By
Ross Wilkers
The seven-year-old cyber startup focuses on operational technology and touts a network of investors including Booz Allen Hamilton's venture arm, AE Industrial Partners and Insight Partners.
Shift5, a cybersecurity startup focused on the protection of defense and transportation systems in the field, has captured $75 million in Series C capital to support new research-and-development efforts and go-to-market operations.
The closure of this funding round comes two years after Shift5 secured $33 million in a Series B raise, which was geared toward support of efforts to expand the customer base and deployments of its core product.
London-headquartered Hedosophia led the Series C round announced Thursday. Booz Allen Hamilton’s venture arm, AE Industrial Partners and Insight Partners are the notable GovCon investor names that also participated.
Other investors included Center 15 Capital, 645 Ventures, Moore Strategic Ventures, Squandra Ventures, Disruptive, CSP Equity Partners and Savano Capital Partners.
Shift5 opened for business in 2018 and develops its operational technology tool for use by operations, maintenance and cybersecurity teams to help protect vehicle fleets. OT references hardware and software that controls industrial equipment, which is featured in aircraft and other transportation systems.
"When we started this company, we set out to solve some of the toughest challenges in operational technology for the nation's critical systems, and this round marks a major milestone that validates our team's work," said Josh Lospinoso, Shift5 CEO and co-founder. "More importantly, it provides rocket fuel to accelerate our mission of equipping the teams that operate and secure these systems with the infrastructure and analytics to detect threats, anticipate failures, and respond with confidence.”
Shift5 has recorded $14.9 million in unclassified prime contract revenue over the trailing 12 months with all of that spend coming from defense agencies, according to USASpending.gov data.
The company also touts a partner network inclusive of Booz Allen, Carahsoft, Amazon Web Services, Boeing, Avionica and ForeFlight.
In conjunction with the Series B round, Palantir's head of defense growth Shannon Clark is joining the Shift5 board of directors.