Panzura LLC, a leader in hybrid multi-cloud data management, raised $80 million in Series B funding from Kayne Partners, the growth private equity group of Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors, and funding from CIBC Innovation Banking. This round continues the company’s growth that started with a refounding of the company by CEO Jill Stelfox and CRO Dan Waldschmidt, who led the asset purchase and assumed leadership in May 2020.
The refounding launched a business turnaround, leading the company through a cultural shift that redefined its core values and brought seven new products to market. The initiatives resulted in a rise in ARR of more than 200 percent and helped Panzura achieve four times the speed of growth over its competitors in 20 months. The company posted a customer retention rate of 97 percent during the period and achieved a best-in-class NPS Score of 87.
Describing the philosophy that led to the company’s turnaround, Stelfox said, “Customers wanted us to do better, and employees wanted a clear vision and mission. To restart this business, we needed an equitable, performance-focused culture that is also compassionate.”
She added, “Our people are everything. That’s why we reset salaries to be gender-equal, freed staff from a traditional office by allowing perpetual remote work and gave each employee $5,000 to use on a career coach.”
This funding allows Panzura to scale operations to service enterprise customers, including key flagship clients like Disney, Milwaukee Tool, BBC America, AmeriHome Mortgage, U.S. government agencies and multiple NFL and MLB teams.
As a cloud data management platform, CTOs choose Panzura’s software to protect their data from ransomware and other cyber threats through immutable storage and make it easier to manage at scale through the use of AI/ML data analytics.
On Panzura’s value to customers, Waldschmidt says, “It’s not rocket science. We save businesses from the unfortunate new normal of ransomware. When ransomware threat becomes irrelevant, companies can breathe a sigh of relief and focus on their business.”
Find out more at panzura.com.
