Shape Security on Tuesday said that it has raised $40 million in venture funding to build out its product line, powered by its ShapeShifter polymorphic security appliance, and sales team. The funding was led by Norwest Ventures and Sierra Ventures joined. Existing Shape investors Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Beyers, Venrock, Google Ventures, Eric Schmidt’s TomorrowVentures and Allegis Capital also participated.
Shape Security — the enterprise startup that emerged from stealth last month with an enterprise product that fights automated malware and bots by way of a firewall (or ‘botwall’ in its words) that shifts its shape depending on what is trying to scale it — has picked up another $40 million in funding. The Series C round will be used to help the startup continue to develop its technology (which today works through a piece of hardware that a client installs on its premises, but may in future move further into a virtualised solution in the cloud); and it will also be used to help build up its salesforce globally, now that Shape is openly marketing itself.