College Park’s Cybrary has raised $25 million in new funding to continue evolving its online cybersecurity training tools in the face of growing industry demand
Investment firm BuildGroup of Austin, Texas, and venture capital group Gula Tech Adventures of Columbia, Maryland — both existing investors — led the Series C round, announced Tuesday. That's more than half of Cybrary’s total $48 million in funding since its 2015 inception, including a $15 million Series B round in 2019.
Cybrary’s software platform provides training for people who want to — or already do — work in the cybersecurity and IT sectors, counting more than 3 million individual users. The aim is to help alleviate the shortage in cybersecurity professionals, an industry that is in high demand but requires specialized skills. In the U.S., another 377,000 workers are needed to meet existing need, according to an estimate from cybersecurity professional organization (ISC)².
Across its offerings, individuals seeking to develop their cybersecurity and IT skills make up about 40% of the company's revenue, with enterprises mostly making up the other 60%, CEO Kevin Hanes said. The firm declined to share current revenue figures, though it was one of Greater Washington's fastest-growing companies last year with a 101.23% annualized growth rate from its $2.75 million in revenue in 2018 to $10.74 million in 2020, according to Washington Business Journal research.
The company is eyeing more growth, hoping to expand its reach around 30% to 4 million users. To do that, Cybrary plans to invest the new $25 million into more research and development across its engineering, product and marketing work, as well as to grow its Cybrary Threat Intelligence Group (CTIG), a team of experts that hones its training exercises to reflect timely, real-world problems.
The hope, Hanes said, is to make the firm’s certification training programs more integrated, with more opportunities for students to enter “simulated and realistic environments that would be pretty similar to what they’d be doing in their security operations roles.” Think less focus on lecture and lab and more focus on hands-on practice.
Cybrary faces competition from well-heeled institutions along that path, beyond traditional four-year universities. Specialized colleges such as Bethesda-based Sans Technology Institute and federal agencies, including the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, provide cyber training modules, even as companies such as Microsoft Corp. announced plans in October to train 250,000 new cybersecurity workers by 2025 by providing free tools to community colleges.
Hanes suggests Cybrary's strict focus gives it an edge against competitors. “There are certainly other IT learning platforms out there that teach all different kinds of IT skills,” he said. “Cybrary is extremely focused on cybersecurity; that’s our niche.”
It's possible Cybrary may make some acquisitions in the future — Hanes said he’s not actively doing deals but would be open to looking at any firms that “allow us to go after our mission faster,” citing tech platforms that could help develop “the realistic nature of the training” or other content that could help with its teaching tools, for example.
It’s also brought on a slew of new executives to help guide its future plans. Cybrary also said Tuesday that Kevin Mandia — founder and CEO of Reston cybersecurity company Mandiant Inc., which announced its $5.4 billion sale to Google in March — has joined its board. In May, it hired David Manynor as head of CTIG and Chloé Messdaghi as chief impact officer. Two months earlier, it hired a chief financial officer in Charlie Booth, chief technology officer in Rob Usey, vice president of marketing in Mary Fad and vice president of people in Tonya Butler. Hanes, the former chief operating officer of SecureWorks, himself joined as Cybrary's CEO in October, replacing co-founder Ryan Corey, who remains a board member.
Today, the firm has about 75 employees, down from around 80 in 2020. It will likely “add a handful” of engineering folks and cybersecurity subject matter experts, Hanes said, but isn’t looking to grow headcount drastically in the next year, remaining short of its target to reach 100 employees in 2020. It’s unclear if the firm has seen layoffs since then or if it reduced its growth plans.
Hanes said the company is reevaluating its real estate since the onset of remote work. It opened a 28,000-square-foot facility at 4600 River Road in College Park's Discovery District last year to some socially distanced fanfare, following a more than two-year wait and initial plans in 2018 to create 200 new jobs in Prince George's County.
Now, Cybrary maintains a flexible policy on remote work, with teams generally going into the office two to three times per week, Hanes said. It’s reorganized the space to allow for more of a “hoteling” system for employees to just drop in occasionally. And in the future, it may consider seeking out a fellow cybersecurity company to share some of that space, Hanes said, emphasizing that he has yet to make a firm decision.
