Cybersecurity Startup WhizHack Raises $3 Mn At $100 Mn Valuation

Cybersecurity startup WhizHack has raised $3 Mn (INR 25.1 Cr) in its Pre-Series A funding round from existing investor SAAA Capital. 

As per the company, the amount was raised at a valuation of $100 Mn. 

Founder Kallol Sil said that the startup will deploy the fresh capital to charge its research and development by collaborating with universities based in India and the US. 

He also claimed that the startup is now looking to raise a successive Series A funding round in “early 2025”. The round will allow the startup to expand into North America and Europe. 

As of now, the startup claims to have grown its business from both enterprise and government clients by over 200% annually and shareholder value by over 50X in the past three years. 

“The past year, we have had remarkable success in winning extremely strategic customers, from diverse segments like banking, manufacturing, FMCG, airports, power SOCs and state Governments against some of the most vaunted global players in cybersecurity,” he said. 

This comes about one and a half year after the startup raised the same amount from existing investor Vedswasti Holdings and SAA Capital. It raised $3 Mn in a Pre-Series A funding round back in January 2023 at a valuation of $40 Mn. 

“WhizHack has delivered exceptional growth for us on the back of their in-house developed suite of cyber security products and services that compete toe to toe with global players,” SAAA Capital’s managing director Ashish Patil said. 

Founded in November 2020 by Kaushik Ray, Sanjay Sengupta and Kallol Sil, WhizHack manages three divisions–ZeroHack, TRACE and Cyber Range. Under these divisions, it offers security solutions, builds security product IPs and offers a mix of online security training to business enterprises and students. In India, it competes with the likes of Kratikal, Hicube and Skylark, among others. 

It counts several IITs, National Power Training Institute (NPTI), Data Security Council of India, and Microsoft as its partners. 

The increased investor interest in the cybersecurity startups comes at a time when incidents related to digital breaches have become more common at a global scale. Most recently, big tech Microsoft has suffered a major global outage in its services, primarily impacting users of its software offering Microsoft 365. 

The outage impacted industries like airline operations as well as India’s brokerage business. Globally, the damages were higher, with even the London Stock Exchange (LSE) being down for several years. The outage was directly caused by a cybersecurity related discrepancy. 

Besides another cybersecurity incident at crypto exchange WazirX led to the loss of nearly $240 Mn for its user base earlier this month.