Goodmail Systems Secures $20 Million in Funding Round Led by Bessemer Venture Partners

Over 300 Million U.S. and European Web Inboxes Supported by Goodmail; Trusted Brands Sending More Than Three Billion CertifiedEmails a Month

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., November 21, 2008 - Goodmail Systems, the creator of CertifiedEmail™, the industry’s standard class of trusted email, today announced that it has raised $20 million in a financing round led by Bessemer Venture Partners. DCM, Emergence Capital Partners and Softbank Capital also participated in the round. The funding comes on the heels of a major milestone for the CertifiedEmail standard, which in September exceeded 3 billion messages per month, a 30-fold increase compared to one year ago.

Goodmail CertifiedEmail™ provides a safe and reliable means for consumers to easily identify authentic messages from legitimate commercial and non-profit senders with whom they have a pre-existing relationship. Available only to senders with the best email practices and consumer reputation, CertifiedEmail messages are delivered directly to the inbox past content and volume filters with all links and images rendered by default, and displayed with a blue ribbon envelope in the email interface. The new funding will enable Goodmail to enhance CertifiedEmail so that non-spam messages with multimedia and active content can also be delivered and opened with complete security.

“Inboxes today are so riddled with phish, spoofs, spam and viruses, that before Goodmail, you needed rubber gloves to open your email,” said David Cowan of Bessemer Venture Partners (who blogs about data security at www.WhoHasTimeForThis.com). “At nearly a billion weekly transactions, we didn’t have to be geniuses to figure out that CertifiedEmail—secured by sender audit procedures and public key cryptography—is emerging as the industry standard for restoring trust to email.”

“In such an adverse financial climate, we were fortunate to have our choice of investors,” said Peter Horan, chief executive officer, Goodmail Systems. “Bessemer was clearly our top pick, based on its unmatched track record in information security as well as its global footprint.”

Bessemer’s security investments include Altiga (Cisco), Counterpane (British Telecom), Cyota (RSA), Intego, Lifelock, ON (Symantec), Perimeter, Postini (Google), Qualys, SiteAdvisor (McAfee), Tumbleweed, Worldtalk and VeriSign, which Cowan co-founded.

 

About Bessemer Venture Partners

Bessemer Venture Partners (http://www.bvp.com) is a global investment group with offices in Silicon Valley, Boston, New York, Bangalore, Mumbai, Beijing and Tel Aviv. As the oldest venture capital practice in the United States, BVP has partnered as an active, hands-on investor in Ciena, Ingersoll Rand, Parametric, Skype, Staples, VeriSign and W.R. Grace, among many others. More than 100 BVP-funded startups have gone public on exchanges in Canada, India, London and the United States.

 

About Goodmail Systems

Goodmail Systems is the creator of CertifiedEmail™, the industry’s standard class of email. CertifiedEmail provides a safe and reliable means for consumers to easily identify authentic email messages from legitimate commercial and nonprofit email senders. Each CertifiedEmail is sent with a cryptographically secure token that assures authenticity and is marked in the inbox with a unique blue ribbon envelope icon, enabling consumers to visually distinguish email messages which are real and sent from email senders with whom they have a pre-existing relationship. Available to email senders meeting strict standards for best practices and low complaint rates, it is the only class of e-mail available that assures delivery of all opt-in e-mail messages to the inbox, with links and images automatically rendered intact, and embedded multi-dimensional applications like CertifiedVideo™ for streaming video, yielding measurable improvements in e-mail effectiveness. CertifiedEmail has been adopted by seven of the nation's top 10 email mailbox providers and is in use by 500 commercial, government and non-profit senders. It is supported in North America and Europe by a wide network of email platforms and service providers.

Goodmail Systems is the creator of CertifiedEmail™, the industry’s standard class of email. CertifiedEmail provides a safe and reliable means for consumers to easily identify authentic email messages from legitimate commercial and nonprofit email senders. Each CertifiedEmail is sent with a cryptographically secure token that assures authenticity and is marked in the inbox with a unique blue ribbon envelope icon, enabling consumers to visually distinguish email messages which are real and sent from email senders with whom they have a pre-existing relationship. Available to email senders meeting strict standards for best practices and low complaint rates, it is the only class of e-mail available that assures delivery of all opt-in e-mail messages to the inbox, with links and images automatically rendered intact, and embedded multi-dimensional applications like CertifiedVideo™ for streaming video, yielding measurable improvements in e-mail effectiveness. CertifiedEmail has been adopted by seven of the nation's top 10 email mailbox providers and is in use by 500 commercial, government and non-profit senders. It is supported in North America and Europe by a wide network of email platforms and service providers.

Media Contacts

PR@GoodmailSystems.com and

Denise Vardakas
The Conversation Group
denise@theconversationgroup.com
+1-650-483-5083