1Password, the password management software developer owned by AgileBits, announced today that it has acquired Kolide, an endpoint security platform, for an undisclosed amount.
According to 1Password CEO Jeff Shiner, Kolide founder and CEO Jason Meller and all 30 Kolide employees will join 1Password “as one intact team.” Meller has taken on the role of VP of Product at 1Password.
“The hybrid workforce that works anywhere and on any device is here to stay, and security has seen a huge impact as a result of this shift,” Shiner told TechCrunch in an email interview. “Employees work on a mix of personal and work devices, and most organizations don’t know how to secure access to their apps and data on those devices. Kolide is the only company in the market with this kind of security and contextual access management solution that can check the health status of a device at the point of authentication in real-time before granting access to enterprise applications.”
Boston, Massachusetts-based Kolide occupies the fast-growing global end-to-end cyber security sector, which is is displayed to reach $23 billion in value by 2027. Competitors include Huntress, Automox and Uptyc, the latter of which is particularly well-funded.
Kolide’s platform, which Meller co-launched in 2016 with Mike Arpaia and Zach Wasserman, offers endpoint notifications related to security, remediation and more delivered through Slack. Customers and their employees get features like the security issues framework, self-healing steps for Mac, Windows, and Linux devices, and a personalized privacy center, all based on the open source and universal endpoint agent project led by Facebook Examination.
Kolide strives to prevent unknown endpoint devices from accessing enterprise applications. When the platform detects a “risky” device trying to access a company’s network, it blocks the attempt and then recommends to the device user steps to restore the device to a “trusted state.”
Kolide’s customer base of over 250 included 1Password at one point (rather by accident), as well as Databricks, Robinhood, Discord and Anduril. Prior to the acquisition, Kolide managed to raise $26.6 million in venture capital from OpenView, Matrix and other VCs and angels.
“Kolide is built on the principle that end users, when genuinely informed and motivated, are perhaps the most effective resource security-focused organizations will ever have against the world’s most subtle and destructive security threats,” Meller told the TechCrunch via email. “Immediately, we knew we had created something special and needed to get it into the hands of as many people as possible. 1Password is a company that not only embodies the same values that made our product possible, but also has the resources to proliferate end-user-focused security solutions to every organization on the planet.”
Kolide is 1Password’s third acquisition after SecretHub, a Dutch cybersecurity company, and Passage, a Texas-based password tool company — and it comes at a prosperous time in the company’s history.
As of last September, 1Password was recording annual recurring revenue of $250 million with a customer base of over 100,000 organizations. Facing headwinds in a weak cybersecurity market, 1Password has bucked the trend — raising hundreds of millions of venture capital dollars at a multibillion-dollar valuation.
Shiner says the company expects to add 250 jobs this year.
“1Password is focused on giving businesses the tools they need to make it easier for employees to keep their passwords secure,” Shiner added. “Kolide further extends this capability to make it easier for employees to keep their devices secure. “Bringing Kolide’s ability to manage app access based on device health to 1Password creates opportunities to create lower-friction, higher-productivity security tools for managing access in the hybrid workplace.”
