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Letter from the CEO: Announcing Our Series C Funding Round

At Arkose Labs, we are very proud of what we have already accomplished and excited for where we are going in the future. That’s why I’m honored to announce that we have recently completed a $70 million Series C funding round led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2*, with participation from Wells Fargo and previous investors M12 and PayPal, bringing Arkose Labs’ total funding amount to $114 million. The new round of funding will go toward growth initiatives, platform development, new hires, and global expansion. 

This latest growth funding means that Arkose Labs has tripled its valuation since the beginning of 2020. This would be a great accomplishment under any circumstances, but the fact we have done so amidst a global pandemic is truly extraordinary. This funding will help us continue to build a portfolio of capabilities that can adapt and respond based on the fraudsters’ techniques to ensure we are maximizing the impact to them whilst minimizing any form of friction to good users. 

The investment from SoftBank Vision Fund 2 is a great validation for the innovative work we have been doing at Arkose Labs in protecting digital platforms and creating a safer internet for all good users. The Vision Fund particularly looks for companies with transformative technology and a long-term scalable business model to become the leading player in their space. 

Since the company was launched, we have been able to strategically grow our customer base and now protect some of the biggest digital ecosystems in finance, gaming, e-commerce, and media. We have been lucky to engage in true partnerships with our customers; we have learned much from them and collaboration with our client partners has been key in the ongoing fight against fraud. From the sales process through implementation and maintaining ongoing customer success, we strive to be highly engaged, responsive, and empathetic to each of our customer’s unique needs. 

This approach has led to our most robust year yet in eliminating fraud and protecting good users. In 2020, we analyzed more than 15 billion online sessions, stopped 4.6 billion attacks, and wasted 40 million hours of fraudsters’ time. 

The Importance of People

Of course, none of this amazing growth would be possible without the team we have built at Arkose Labs. We have more than doubled our headcount over the past year, and plan to double again by the end of the year. The success of Arkose Labs is due to the passion and dedication our team — across all departments — has to see our customers succeed. 

Our team now spans three different continents and too many time zones to count. Throughout the lockdowns of 2020, we put a focus on building strong remote-work culture, where everyone is productive but also feels connected. As we return to physical offices in some of our locations and move to a hybrid remote-onsite structure, we are committed to maintaining this strong sense of culture and connection company-wide.  

Looking Ahead

The growth Arkose Labs has achieved over the past few years has been stunning, but it is only the beginning of our story. This latest round of funding and long-term partnership with SoftBank will allow us to accelerate our mission of bankrupting the business model of fraud. This is more imperative than ever, as the number of digital users grows daily and fraudsters continue to launch increasingly sophisticated attacks. To all of our customers, team members, and partners in the fraud-fighting space, we thank you and look forward to the next chapter of our journey. 

*** This is a Security Bloggers Network syndicated blog from Arkose Labs authored by Kevin Gosschalk. Read the original post at: https://www.arkoselabs.com/blog/letter-from-the-ceo-announcing-our-series-c-funding-round/

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Kevin Gosschalk

Kevin Gosschalk is the CEO and Founder of Arkose Labs, where he leads a team of people focused on telling computers and humans apart on the Internet. He gained early recognition for his work with the Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation (QUT) as part of the LANDMark (Longitudinal Assessment of Novel Ophthalmic Diabetic Markers) study, where he developed an innovative mapping technique to detect early signs of diabetes using non- invasive methods. Before Arkose Labs, Kevin worked on gaming hardware for the intellectually disabled at the Endeavour Foundation and built a unique device incorporating Microsoft’s Kinect Camera technology. Noted for his involvement in interactive development and machine vision, Kevin then turned his expertise to automated abuse and human verification — often regarded as the Internet’s impossible problem. Today, Arkose Labs has transformed the irritating chore of comprehension into an SLA-guaranteed technology that prevents automated abuse for brands like Electronic Arts, Singapore Airlines, and Roblox.

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