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Funding Secured Will Accelerate Market Penetration of Leading WLAN Intrusion Protection and Analysis System
April 14, 2005
Network Chemistry Inc., the leader in wireless network intrusion protection and analysis systems announced today that it has closed a venture capital financing round, led by Geneva Venture Partners, joined by Innovacom, the investment arm of France Telecom, and In-Q-Tel, the investment arm of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), securing in total $6 million. The proceeds will be used to accelerate sales and marketing efforts for Network Chemistry's RFprotect, a product family of distributed and mobile wireless intrusion protection systems for enterprises of all sizes. RFprotect is the leading intrusion protection system in terms of total volume of sensor agents shipped by the company and its licensees.
In addition to the investment, the company is announcing new additions to its board of directors, including Robert Troy, Managing Director of Geneva Venture Partners, Aymerik Renard, Managing Director of Innovacom, and Lou Ryan, former CEO of Entercept Security, who will act as Executive Chairman. The new board members are joined by existing directors Robert Markovich and Chris Waters, Network Chemistry's CEO and CTO.
"I am continually impressed by what Network Chemistry has accomplished since its 2002 inception," said Robert Troy. "The company has a rare combination of proven business executives and truly ground-breaking technology. The founding team brings great enthusiasm, expertise, and dedication toward this market. We fully believe in their vision, and their ability to definitively resolve the security bottleneck limiting enterprise adoption of wireless."
"The move to wireless LANs is a trend, not a fad," said Lou Ryan. "But WLANs won't be broadly adopted by enterprises until they're protected from RF security vulnerabilities and performance degradations. Network Chemistry's RF analysis technology is rapidly becoming the de facto industry standard for WLAN intrusion protection and analysis. This is a huge market opportunity and I am thrilled to be involved with the company."
"This is an ideal group of investors for our company," said Robert Markovich, CEO of Network Chemistry. "Geneva Venture Partners, Innovacom, and In-Q-Tel will accelerate access to strategic resources that will broaden our market reach. The new board members are proven entrepreneurs with extensive industry experience. Their support and backing are more validation of our vision to instrument wireless networks for security and performance, to transport business-critical applications at the quality of wired networks."
About New Board Members:
Robert Troy, a Managing Director and co-founder of Geneva Venture Partners, is a veteran entrepreneur with more than 30 years of managerial experience in the software business. In 1984, he founded Verilog and served as President and CEO until the company was sold in 1994. Robert currently serves at the board of directors of Santa Cruz Networks and participates to the Board of Karna Global Technologies. Prior recent board experience includes Zantaz and Ipin (acquired by Valista). He brings significant expertise in management, strategy, global development, marketing and technology. Robert holds a Doctor degree. in Computer Science from University P. Sabatier, Toulouse, France and has authored a number of papers on software technology and the industry.
Aymerik Renard joined Innovacom in 1996, opening the company's North American office in San Francisco. Aymerik has worked with Internet technologies since 1989, and focuses on enterprise and telecom software investments. Prior to joining Innovacom, Aymerik headed France Telecom North America's Internet and online service-related business development activities, where he performed technology, market and strategic analyses and participated in partnership and joint venture negotiations, working closely with various France Telecom operating units. Aymerik is a graduate of Carnegie Mellon University in information and decision systems, as well as policy and management.
Lou Ryan was president CEO and founder of Entercept Security Technology which was acquired by McAfee in April 2003. Lou was also an early investor and board member of Foundstone, a vulnerability management supplier acquired by McAfee in August 2004. Lou has 22 years of computer industry management experience, including a previous role as co-founder and executive vice president of worldwide sales at Delrina Corp., a leading software supplier with over $100 million in annual sales, which was later acquired by Symantec in 1995. Lou also serves on the board of Certicom Corporation, and is an advisor to SandHill Capital, SandHill Security, and DiamondHead Ventures.
About Network Chemistry's RFprotect
Network Chemistry's RFprotect product family protects wired and wireless networks from wireless-specific vulnerabilities, rogues, and attacks. RFprotect is the industry's first wireless IDS/IPS designed with the high scalability, open integration, and auto-maintenance required for large enterprise and government deployments. At the same time, the system delivers the lowest entry cost and total ownership costs in the industry.
About Geneva Venture Partners
Geneva Venture Partners (GVP) is an early stage venture capital fund founded in 1998 by experienced operating executives to assist committed entrepreneurs in building successful software companies. GVP supports the entrepreneur's vision through its extensive access to world class executive talent, and depth of real-world business experience in helping driven entrepreneurs build successful software companies. GVP helps entrepreneurs get access to industry luminaries, prospective customers and distribution partners globally, world-class board members and exceptional candidates for key positions. GVP focuses its investments on the enterprise software, infrastructure software, wireless, RFID, VoIP and embedded technology sectors. For more information, visit www.genevavc.com.
About Innovacom
For over fifteen years, Innovacom has invested in the entrepreneurs building the telecom and information technologies of tomorrow. Innovacom works with some of the brightest minds in the business, the early stage companies focused on the components, hardware, software and content that improve the ability of telecom carriers to deliver services. As the venture subsidiary of France Telecom, Innovacom is uniquely positioned to help its portfolio companies not only with capital, but with connections to the best research and deployment facilities in Europe and North America. Past investments include Business Objects, Cobalt Networks, Gemplus, Infovista, Intershop, Kelkoo, Soitec, and Tumbleweed. With 400 million dollars under management, Innovacom has offices in Paris, Stockholm, and San Francisco. For more information, visit www.innovacom.com.
About Network Chemistry
Network Chemistry provides enterprise-class systems that increase the security and performance of wireless networks, enabling them for business critical applications. Its award-winning RFprotect system is the industry's first high-scale wireless intrusion protection system, providing complete detection, assessment, prevention, and auditing of wireless threats and attacks, all at a breakthrough reduction of total ownership costs. Network Chemistry, founded in 2002, is based in Menlo Park, California and is privately funded by Geneva Venture Partners, Innovacom (the venture arm of France Telecom), and In-Q-Tel (the venture arm of the Central Intelligence Agency). For more information, visit www.networkchemistry.com.