xorlab raises CHF 6.1 million Series A to build the next generation of enterprise communication defense

25.10.2021 14:49, Isabelle Mitchell

Swiss-based cyber defense company xorlab has closed CHF 6.1 million in Series A funding. The round was led by EquityPitcher Ventures and completed by existing investors Spicehaus Partners, Zürcher Kantonalbank, and Hasler Foundation. Several private investors also extended their stake in the company. The funding will fuel xorlab’s growth as the company expands its team and technology to support new customers in Europe and beyond. xorlab won Venture Kick in 2016, was one of the TOP 100 Swiss Startups from 2016 to 2021, and is a Venture Leader Technology 2021. 

xorlab is building the next generation of enterprise communication defense for companies with high requirements for business integrity and information protection. xorlab’s security SaaS platform uses machine learning and advanced software analysis to identify and stop emerging cyberattacks on employees, such as Ransomware and Spear-phishing, and helps security teams get back control over their data.

CEO Antonio Barresi, a Venture Leader Technology 2021, explained: “Our customers work with us because we consistently detect and stop what everyone else in the market can’t—advanced attacks that have never been seen before. We believe that this is an attractive value proposition to many more companies, and we’ll use the additional funding to accelerate our international expansion and to continue bringing innovation to our product offering.”

The two Founding Partners at EquityPitcher Ventures are convinced that cybersecurity is one of the most crucial topics of today, as the increasing number of cybersecurity startups in their portfolio attests. “We decided to lead this financing round as xorlab’s product is industry-leading, and the company will now need to scale globally. We aim to support our portfolio companies during this phase through network, know-how, and capital,” said Sascha Horrig. Hermann Koch added: “We have been particularly impressed by the diversified and well-educated team with heterogeneous skills and a strong knowledge of the industry.”

xorlab was founded in 2015 by ETH Zurich computer science graduates Antonio Barresi and Matthias Ganz to redefine enterprise communications security. They set out to address the frustration shared by many organizations paying lots of money for security software that did not protect them from receiving targeted email attacks. “Our mission was to build an email security solution that is effective and capable of stopping zero-day and low-volume personalized attacks,” said Barresi. “We built on our experience from past email penetration tests and built the software from the point of view of an attacker.”

Today, many of the largest Swiss companies, including private bank Julius Bär, Swiss Post, the Swiss Federal Railway (SBB), the Swiss telecom provider Swisscom and leading construction company Implenia use xorlab to protect their employees against highly sophisticated, targeted attacks and to automate internal security workflows.


The xorlab team