One of Orange County’s fastest growing companies is crafting a strategy to claim new ground with a push into the consumer market.
Software security provider Cylance Inc.—which has zoomed to $100 million in annual revenue in less than four years—is taking a different approach in the fragmented segment led by the likes of Norton Antivirus and McAfee.
Gone are the days of selling software at big-box retailers, such as Best Buy and Fry’s Electronics. Even traditional online retail is giving way to mobile and the ubiquitous smartphone.
“The traditional ways of consumer selling are really not applicable these days,” Cylance Chief Executive Stuart McClure said over a recent lunch at Il Fornaio in Irvine, in the shadow of the company’s growing headquarters operations at Von Karman Avenue and Michaelson Drive. “Everything is going through the mobile device.”
Partnerships
Cylance is aiming to forge partnerships with service providers, such as banks and internet and cable providers, which have millions of app users and customers. McClure envisions a scenario where a bank customer’s drive is infected with malware intended to siphon funds, and instead of simply receiving a notification that the account is temporarily blocked, the user can tap a button to clean up the breach immediately.
“That now becomes a service provider play,” he says. “Those are the new channels for a lot of the selling.”
McClure believes the company can get more than the $39 to $89 consumers typically pay annually for such services, particularly as smartphones continue to be a key tool of daily life, activating products from door locks and lighting to home entertainment systems and smart sensors.
“I believe we can get north of that,” McClure said, calling home security a “critical anchor point for us.”
The service should roll out next year.
Cylance so far has been focused on business accounts.
McClure said the company currently prevents between 1,500 and 2,000 attacks each week—ransomware, viruses, spyware and worms, among others—for its growing base of more than 1,000 customers, which includes a number of Fortune 500 companies and government agencies.
Its software fuses machine learning, artificial intelligence algorithms, and the cloud to thwart new and evolving threats and cyberattacks before they hit servers, desktops and virtual desktops.
“We’re just keen on trying to get our technology in the hands of everyone in the world,” McClure said. “That’s always been part of the original vision.”
The move toward the consumer market follows several developments at Cylance, which raised $100 million last month in a Series D round led by Blackstone Tactical Opportunities and that included strategic investor Citi Ventures, the venture and innovation arm of New York-based Citigroup Inc., the third largest bank in the U.S. with $1.77 trillion in assets.
Cylance has raised $177 million since its inception in 2012.
The funding and strong demand has prompted the company to double employment in the past year to more than 400 globally, with additional offices in Portland, Ore.; London; Tokyo; and Sydney. It recently expanded offerings to the Nordic countries, Canada and Japan.
175 at HQ
The software maker’s headquarters at 18201 Von Karman Ave. is nearly filled to capacity with 175 employees, a mix of customer service, technical support, quality and assurance, IT personnel, and a threat guidance team that produces industry reports on burgeoning, active and disabled cybersecurity threats. A hiring blitz prompted the company to take an additional floor in the building and office space for its marketing team at nearby 18500 Von Karman Ave.
Cylance also is building out a few floors at 18200 Von Karman Ave., which appears to be slated as its new headquarters.
