IP Fabric, the market leader in automated network assurance, has announced a $25 million Series B funding round. The round was led by One Peak, with participation from Senovo and Presto Ventures. The funding will help further IP Fabric’s mission of making network assurance ubiquitous, helping organisations to improve security and guarantee the operation of networks.
The challenges of essential but complex private networks
While people are familiar with the internet, and its origins as a network designed to be resilient, private networks are, collectively, significantly larger and much of our modern life depends on their resilience. From operating airports to public utilities, manufacturing to financial systems, the smooth operation of private networks is critical to our lives. However, as technology advances, these networks become more and more complex, creating risk. Whether it’s unintended consequences of changes, or security risks that were not spotted in time, network failures can have devastating and even life-or-death consequences.
A key problem is that network growth occurs over time. This means that many different developers may work on the same network, with functions added or falling into disuse, and no single person or team has a full overview. It means that changes can have unintended consequences, and when things do go wrong, they are hard to fix, resulting in long outages and data breaches that propel companies into the headlines for the wrong reasons.
And a surprising number of businesses are at risk from their networks, Humbert de Liedekerke, Co-founder and Managing Partner of One Peak, pointed out: “Gartner has reported only 26% of network leaders maintain accurate network data, massively hindering the effectiveness of automation initiatives for 74% of enterprises.”
Assuring the safety and security of networks
To address this, IP Fabric has pioneered network assurance. Rather than relying on developing and retaining institution knowledge about a private network, their API-first and vendor neutral approach can model and visualise networks. “We’ve seen how network outages can cause businesses and critical infrastructure to grind to a halt,” said IP Fabric CEO Pavel Bykov. “IP Fabric delivers the network assurance needed to operate without the exponential risk of network failure or outages while enabling innovation through standardised access to network control data.”
IP Fabric’s solution allows private network operators to identify and troubleshoot problems with their existing network. It also affords them the ability to assure network automations and enhancements, so they can improve their systems without paying the price of creating issues or vulnerabilities in their systems.
The need for network assurance has seen IP Fabric recognised as Gartner Cool Vendor in Network Automation and their rapid growth — they have seen an annual growth rate of 160% over the past four years — put them in the top ten of the Deloitte Technology Fast 50. However, the value of their product is perhaps best demonstrated by their clients, they have over a hundred enterprise clients globally. Businesses that rely on IP Fabric’s network assurance include Airbus and Air France, Major League Baseball, and even tech giants like Red Hat, HCL Technologies, Avast, and Blackberry.
