Option3 combines a cyber heritage from the classified world of national security with investment and M&A expertise from Wall Street to family offices, and operational experience spanning the C-suite. With a portfolio that includes earlier stage, growth and buyout (pending) deals, we primarily seek control investments in mid-market companies, particularly in areas that are national priorities as we build or assemble leaders of tomorrow.
About Option3
We primarily seek control investments in the growing cybersecurity mid-market, seeking to build champions with the scale to bring cutting-edge products to market efficiently, thereby ensuring the security and resiliency of the country.
We founded Option3 in 2015 as a specialist cybersecurity investment firm with the mission to make high risk-adjusted returns by investing in those companies and capabilities that America most needed in the coming five years. In that time, we have invested in 9 companies, with three successful exits and a further four pending.
Option3’s success lies in combining a deep heritage in the national security community with decades of experience in the investment industry. But our focus has evolved.
We started off making largely minority investments in earlier-stage companies but gradually moved to control or joint control investments, and now focus primarily on mid-market buyouts.
This shift reflects changing opportunities as the cybersecurity sector itself grew and matured, and also the investment experience of our management team which ranges from seed to IPO, and a demonstrated preference for active management and board control.
Investment and Operating Team
Over the past six years, we have successfully built a culture and team that integrates deep cyber expertise gained in the classified world of U.S. national security with investment and finance prowess that arises from decades at major Wall Street institutions, insurance companies, and family offices.
The team’s prior C-suite experience cuts across areas from finance to marketing and technology and has an active role in the lives of its portfolio companies, including multiple board seats on all recent investments.
For this team, it is understood that both money and mission are of equal importance. Together, the team has successfully managed nine investments, building deep institutional memory of deal origination, diligence and negotiation, followed by years of portfolio management and a growing base of real-world M&A exits.
We have built and refined the systems, processes, and benchmarks to the maturity necessary to run ever larger pools of capital. This was recently demonstrated when the team made an internal valuation metric publicly available, transforming it into the newest cybersecurity stock index available in the market today.
Manish Thakur
Managing Partner
Anannya Lohia
Principal
Abhijeet Mahajan
Principal
Jason Holley
Press Contact
Shail Shukla
Analyst
Technology Board
At the heart of Option3’s decision making is its Technology Board. This board assesses each investment we make, while understanding the greatest returns are achieved by focusing on companies and capabilities that America needs most in the next five years.
We do not come from the perspective of commercial technologists. We are people who have spent their lives fighting an unseen adversary, largely in the U.S. National Security Community, with former CIOs and board members of such organizations as the DoD, CIA, and NSA forming the core of the Option3 Technology Board.
Complementing this is a growing group of former CIOs and senior cyber executives from such companies as General Motors, CISCO, and Hewlett Packard.
John Stenbit
Former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense and Current Advisory Board member of NSA
Alan Wade
Former Chief Information Officer of CIA
Greg Akers
Former SVP Advanced Security initiatives, CISCO
Advisory Council
We have built an ecosystem, both formal and informal, of expertise across multiple disciplines that we draw upon in our deal origination/diligence, fundraising, and in growing and ultimately exiting our portfolio companies.
The most visible part of this ecosystem is our Advisory Council, located both in the U.S. and in select aligned nations around the world that have capabilities in cybersecurity. The Council brings together domain expertise in legal, finance, marketing, insurance, public relations, and human resources.
Some of its members are listed below:
Sean Plankey
Former Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security and Emergency Response, Department of Energy.
Jennifer Fearon
Managing Partner of VentureLink Advisers, a corporate finance, business and financial consulting firm. Advising Option3 since 2016.
Christopher Carolan
Partner at Baker & Hostetler LLP. Advisor to Option3 since its founding.
Jamil Sopher
Family Office Investor, early entrant into cyber sector. First outside investor in Option3. Former Senior Project Manager, World Bank.
Funds
OPTION 3 CYBER INVESTMENTS LLC (C1)
Option3 Cyber Investments LLC (C1) was conceived and launched soon after the company’s founding in 2015 as its market debut investment fund and funded by the Firm’s partners and closely related investors. Its concentrated portfolio, comprising three venture investments, is tracking for returns far outpacing all benchmarks. As of early 2021, this vehicle’s estimated value is approximately $80M, following one exit and a large unrealized gain.
Centripetal Networks
Provides automated cybersecurity threat remediation by aggregating and applying threat intelligence at a speed and scale unmatched today (providing real-time defense against known bad actors on the Internet).
Series A-2 Round
Threat Intelligence
Certes Networks
Provides a highly proprietary approach to software defined security that will accelerate the $1 trillion communications sector’s transfer from hardware to software, providing enterprises with network security at a scale well beyond the competition.
Image Risk Analytics
OPTION3 CYBER SPECIAL SITUATIONS LLC (CS)
Launched in 2020 as a “Special Situations” portfolio in light of the extraordinary circumstances brought on by the COVID pandemic. CS started similarly in size to C1, quickly doubling, with four investments today. With one successful exit and one underway, CS was always seen as a short-term vehicle. The portfolio is currently being sold at fair market value to Option3 ENIGMA, our new defense platform, with one company having already exited and another underway. Based upon our forecasts, we expect CS returns to compare very favorably with relevant benchmarks, and many of its investors continuing on as investors in ENIGMA.
Dellfer
Dellfer protected connected devices and apps act as threat sensors. With Dellfer’s comprehensive and continuous protection your connected devices and apps remain safe. The key to cyberattack detection and prevention is awareness.
Series A Round
Joint Lead
Automotive Security
Onclave
Onclave brings the same level of protection to IoT that our military and Intelligence communities employ to protect our nation’s most critical assets.
Series B Round
Co-Investor
IoT/OT Security
Veracity
Veracity’s resilient software-defined industrial network provides an on premises, centralized configuration, control and monitoring solution that tracks all connected devices and their communications.
Series A Round
Joint Lead
Industrial Controls
Successful Exits
Watchful Software
Watchful Software provides user-friendly, data-centric classification and keystroke dynamics that don’t impact your users. RightsWATCH and TypeWATCH are tailored to provide persistent security solutions that prevent accidental and malicious disclosure. As a result, your security protocols are enhanced and compliance becomes the rule.
Series A. Convertible Debt
Data Loss Prevention
OmniEarth
Pioneered the application of artificial intelligence/ machine learning analytics to satellite/ drone imagery/ sensory data and big data to extract actionable, predictive business intelligence that was previously unobtainable.
Software Defined Networking
Dark Cubed
Dark Cubed is a powerful and easy-to-use cyber security software as a service (SaaS) platform that deploys instantly and delivers enterprise-grade threat identification and protection at a fraction of the cost.
SMB Threat Intelligence
Cyber Insurance
Our Investment History:
Since its founding, Option3 has made 8 venture stage investments with 4 buyouts / growth investments underway. In total current investments and deals that are under way exceed $100m in assets under management.
Our investments to date have been largely made through two investment vehicles that we have managed since 2016. We launched a third vehicle launched in late 2023 that is engaging in a Roll-Up of existing companies, which includes buying the remaining assets of our second vehicle.
The portfolios of our various investment vehicles reflect Option3’s evolving investment focus from earlier stage venture to buyouts or control investments in the mid-market, and include Option3 directly creating new cybersecurity companies, whether through Roll-Up or standalone.
- C1 (2016): portfolio of 3 minority investments in earlier-stage companies.
- CS (2020): “Special Situations” portfolio of 4 minority stakes, some with board control. The remaining portfolio is now being sold to our CE platform.
- CE (2025): a single platform, formed by a Roll-Up that starts with the buyouts of the CS companies, adding other earlier-stage and mid-market Zero Trust companies.
Option3 is currently working on launching one more initiative in 2025.
- CD (2025E): a dynamic new concept seeking to transform the field of cyber insurance, created in partnership with the insurance, cyber, and AI industries.
The CS portfolio has been valued and closed, with investors being bought out by our new Zero Trust platform Roll-Up. The CS portfolio registered a return of 2.6x, far in excess of both overall market or its most directly comparable benchmark index.
Since 2016, we have exited three of our investments, all through sales to strategic buyers. We currently are exiting four more investments, including our remaining 3 positions in the CS portfolio which have been independently valued ahead of their sale to our CE Zero Trust platform. Upon Close, Option3 would have exited its CS portfolio entirely.
Current Focus Investment Areas:
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Industrial Controls
Automotive Security -
Defense/C5ISR
Cyber Insurance
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Operational Technology
Internet of Things/ IIOT -
Zero Trust Solutions
Healthcare IT
ENIGMA
ENIGMA is an American cybersecurity platform that seeks to accelerate the adoption of Zero Trust, a new paradigm in security. It is created out of purpose-built Zero Trust technologies in the portfolio of Option3. It will accelerate the adoption of Zero Trust, a key component to hardening the nation’s cybersecurity. Enigma draws on Option3’s deep understanding of the needs of the federal customer and launches with over $100M in acquisitions.
ENIGMA launched in August 2021 with its foundational acquisition of Onclave Networks, which uses Zero Trust principles and proven methods developed by the U.S. Department of Defense to secure devices, services and people across diverse environments. Onclave was recently awarded the first ever “Authority to Operate1” ever given by any federal agency for Zero Trust compliance, and its products are being adopted by the White House Communications Agency, Defense Health Agency and NATO. ENIGMA specializes in applying Zero Trust to Operational Technology and IoT/IIoT networks, with large deployments planned in the U.S. hospital network and global auto sector.
Onclave leverages Zero Trust principles and proven methods used by the U.S. Department of Defense to dramatically reduce security breaches, decreasing attack surfaces, network complexity, and operational costs. In acquiring Onclave, ENIGMA is able to secure devices, services, and people across diverse environments.
Zero Trust has gained rapid prominence in recent years, particularly with President Biden’s 2021 mandate requiring all federal agencies adopt it. But implementing Zero Trust has proved challenging. ENIGMA addresses many of these challenges, offering a growing array of purpose-built Zero Trust capabilities that have been tested at scale by some of the world’s most demanding users with major deployments now planned in the U.S. hospital system and global auto sector.
Zero Trust is Not a Single Technology
The rise of the cloud, mobility and remote working (especially post-COVID) combined with heightened attacks by nation states, bad actors getting access inside the network perimeter has rendered the model of cybersecurity based around networks and perimeters increasingly ineffective. Zero Trust assumes that there is no traditional network edge. Importantly, it is not a single technology or product, but a framework and ecosystem of capabilities. In recent years, Zero Trust has become a critical component in contemporary cybersecurity strategies, addresses the blurred boundaries of companies in the post-COVID world. Option3 believes Zero Trust is likely to become the de facto global standard, particularly following the 2021 Presidential Executive Order mandating its adoption by the U.S. federal government.
Contact Us
745 Fifth Avenue, Suite 500
New York, NY 10151
1818 Library Street, Suite 500
Reston, VA 20190