WireWheel Raises $20 Million in Series B Funding

PRESS RELEASE

ARLINGTON, Va., Feb. 10, 2021 -- WireWheel, a leader in data privacy technology, today announced $20 million in Series B financing led by ForgePoint Capital. Existing investors New Enterprise Associates, Revolution's Rise of the Rest Fund, PSP Growth, Grotech and Sands Capital Ventures also participated in the round, bringing total capital raised by the company to $45 million. The funding will enable WireWheel to speed its go-to-market plans and extend its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform's leadership as the only solution built specifically for ease of use by privacy professionals and tailored to the needs of engineering and data governance teams. Andrew McClure of ForgePoint Capital will join WireWheel's board of directors.

"We are proudly delivering a cloud-based, technology-first privacy platform to some of the biggest brands in the world," said Justin Antonipillai, Founder and CEO of WireWheel. "Our mission is to make this enterprise-grade privacy infrastructure available to every company, so that everyone can responsibly protect personal data and ethically use it to solve their business problems. ForgePoint is the perfect partner for the next stage of our growth, and we are proud to partner with this team on our journey."

WireWheel's SaaS Platform supports full cycle global privacy management for organizations large and small. The Company's Privacy Operations Manager automates data discovery, inventories, privacy assessments, incident management, and privacy compliance throughout a company and its partner and vendor ecosystem. The Trust Access and Consent product enables consumer controls and access to their data. Through these offerings, companies not only comply more quickly with global privacy laws, like the European GDPR and California CCPA, but can enable greater, more responsible use of personal data by bridging between compliance and governance systems.

"WireWheel's best-in-class software orchestrates trust for privacy teams who don't just want to check a box," said Andrew McClure, Principal at ForgePoint Capital. "That's why some of the most privacy-mature organizations look to the team at WireWheel not only for domain expertise, but also for unmatched product sophistication. Customers leverage WireWheel's core privacy platform to get in compliance fast, and build privacy protection directly into their DevOps pipelines, their products, and their data use and governance programs. We're excited to work with the team at WireWheel to advance the company's leadership in this fast-growing market."

In the last year, WireWheel released the WireWheel Developer Portal to enable technology-driven companies to build privacy and data protection directly into their products; launched the WireWheel's Spokes Privacy Technology Conference, now one of the largest privacy conferences in the world, to offer free access to the best privacy knowledge and training; and made its enterprise-grade privacy and data protection infrastructure available for every startup and SMB through its "Essentials" offering.

"From the beginning, we recognized WireWheel as a company that will act as a catalyst for privacy protection and innovation," said Penny Pritzker, Chairman and Founder of PSP Partners. "The key has been that WireWheel is focused both on helping companies comply with privacy laws around the world, and on helping them ethically use data to solve customer problems. Just think of how much can be accomplished with greater trust and transparency regarding data between companies and their valued customers … WireWheel can help drive that change."

"WireWheel's leadership team truly understands privacy and they're doing industry-leading work to help innovators build trusted products and services," said Michael Graninger, Partner, Sands Capital Ventures. "Building trust in tech requires a seamless way to incorporate privacy into products from day one and WireWheel is leading that effort."

Justin Antonipillai, Founder and CEO of WireWheel, is recognized as one of the leading experts on privacy and data protection, having led a number of high-priority international efforts around privacy and security as Acting Under Secretary for Economic Affairs at the U.S. Department of Commerce during the Obama Administration. The WireWheel team also comprises privacy experts, data scientists, cloud architects, PhDs, policy experts and others with deep domain expertise around data, privacy and building trust in the digital era. 

"Every member of our team is truly passionate about our mission and our vision doesn't stop at assuring compliance for the sake of it," said Antonipillai. "We believe privacy is a fundamental human right and we want every organization in the world to succeed at it."

About WireWheel
Based in Arlington, Virginia, WireWheel's intuitive privacy management SaaS platform delivers privacy programs at scale, enabling collaboration and leveraging integrations into cloud infrastructure and on-premises and cloud data stores. With WireWheel, organizations can support all phases of a privacy management program – including collaboration and vendor risk management – and more effectively comply with privacy regulations around the world, including the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) and the new California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA). Learn more at wirewheel.io.

About ForgePoint Capital
ForgePoint Capital is the premier cybersecurity venture fund investing in transformative companies protecting the digital world. The firm is one of the most prolific investors in early and growth stage cybersecurity companies with over 40 global cybersecurity investments. The team brings more than eight decades of company building, value creation experience and draws upon the largest network of trusted cybersecurity industry experts and customers to support entrepreneurs who are building great companies. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, the firm partners with exceptional cybersecurity entrepreneurs worldwide. For more information, please visit www.forgepointcap.com or follow us @ForgePointCap.

About PSP Partners and PSP Growth
PSP Partners is a Chicago-based private investment firm founded by its Chairman Penny Pritzker, an entrepreneur, civic leader, and philanthropist, and former U.S. Secretary of Commerce. The firm is comprised of a highly experienced team of investment professionals and business builders focused on partnering with entrepreneurs, business owners, and management teams to build market-leading businesses and develop valuable assets. With investment strategies focused on established businesses (PSP Capital), emerging/growth companies (PSP Growth) and real assets (Pritzker Realty Group), PSP Partners invests across stages and asset classes with an emphasis on four primary segments of the economy – business & technology services, housing, industrials and food and agriculture – that are well-aligned with its expertise and experience. For more information, visit www.psppartners.com. 

About Sands Capital Ventures
Sands Capital Ventures invests in entrepreneurs building businesses in three dynamic, high-growth markets: Life Sciences, Technology, and Global Consumer. As the venture capital affiliate of Sands Capital Management, Sands Capital Ventures brings significant global diligence capabilities based on our deep domain experience. Sands Capital Ventures likes to back businesses that are creating scalable innovations that have the potential to become market leaders.