Thoma Bravo, a leading private equity investment firm, announced it will acquire a majority interest in Centrify, the market-leading next-generation Identity & Access Management platform, from its venture capital investors, led by Mayfield, Accel Partners, Jackson Square Ventures and Index Ventures. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of this year, subject to usual and customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals. Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed.
According to the 2018 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report, compromised user identities are the top cybersecurity attack vector, and with the shift to cloud computing by enterprises, cloud security risks such as password sprawl and privileged access management are expected to accelerate. Centrify meets these challenges as the only “Leader” in both The Forrester Wave Privileged Identity Management (PIM) and Identity-As-A-Service (IDaaS) reports. By converging these solutions into a unified†Next-Gen Access†platform for†Zero Trust Security, Centrify is well-positioned as an early entrant and cybersecurity innovator of next-generation technology that protects its customers’ assets and access to information from external and internal cyber threats.
Founded in 2004 and headquartered in†Santa Clara, California, Centrify serves over five thousand customers spanning the public and private sectors, including blue-chip Global 2000s, across diverse industries including defense, banking, energy, retail, manufacturing, and healthcare.
“Centrify has seen tremendous growth, and joining with an experienced partner like Thoma Bravo not only ensures we take advantage of existing market opportunities, but also positions us to continue to lead in this growing industry,” said†Tom Kemp, co-founder and CEO of Centrify. “With Thoma Bravo’s extensive sector experience and insight in the enterprise security software space, Centrify is in a strong position to provide our products, services and unique expertise to meet the rising need for identity-based cybersecurity technology in today’s global environment.”
Thoma Bravo, an established investor in enterprise security software, has successfully partnered with other innovators in the growing identity space, including Bomgar and SailPoint. The firm’s longtime experience investing in the sector and ability to build a productive partnership with a company’s existing management differentiates them within the private equity community.
“Having invested successfully several times in the identity market, we’ve known and watched Centrify as a leader for many years, and we absolutely share the company’s vision on where the market is headed,” said A.J. Rohde, a partner at Thoma Bravo. “We are unbelievably excited to partner with†Tom Kemp†and his world-class team to continue to disrupt and expand the identity market organically and through M&A, all while partnering with the team to help institute our best-in-class processes.”
“Centrify is unique in that it offers products across the entire continuum of identity access management through a cutting-edge, natively built cloud platform,” said†Carl Press, a principal at Thoma Bravo. “We see opportunities to both strengthen its leadership position within the privileged identity market as well as accelerate its growth in single sign-on (SSO) and multi-factor authentication (MFA).”
Kirkland & Ellis is serving as Thoma Bravo’s legal advisor, and Golub Capital is providing financing for the transaction.†Sidley Austin†is Centrify’s legal advisor, and Barclays is serving as its financial advisor.
