Internet of things (IoT) cybersecurity startup Sternum has today announced that it has raised $6.5m in a Series A funding round.

Led by Square Peg, the funding round saw additional investment in Sternum from business leader Merle Hinrich, who has previously invested in the company, as well as btov, a European venture capital firm. Additional funding also came from entrepreneur Eyal Shavit and Udi Mokady, CEO and founder of CyberArk.

It brings the total raised by the startup to $10m since it was founded in 2018.

Sternum, which is based in Tel Aviv, Israel, is taking on the well-established issue of IoT security. While IoT devices are seeing an ongoing surge in number, with 40 billion expected to be in use globally by 2025, their security has often been seriously lacking.

Common vulnerabilities have been exploited by a variety of threat actors, including those backed by nation states,  while even children have been exposed due to a lack of focus on the issue.

Sternum is tackling this challenge by providing embedded security in IoT devices, which can be integrated both at the point of manufacture or at any point in their lifecycle. Integrated at the binary level, these are designed to work wide a wide variety of IoT devices running different software architecture.

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According to the startup, this eliminates the need to patch individual vulnerabilities, instead providing a blanket security solution against attacks and exploits that also enables full visibility of devices on a network.

Sternum funding shows potential of blanket IoT security solution

With such a broad range of IoT devices now available, Sternum is targeting its solutions at multiple sectors, including smart energy and utilities, industrial IoT and healthcare.

“I’m excited to say that we are the only company offering both an embedded, agentless and holistic security solution for all IoT devices, as well as the ability to monitor them through an intelligent cloud platform, no matter the operating system or resources available, thus creating the first on-device technology acceptable by all IoT devices,” said Natali Tshuva, CEO and co-founder of Sternum.

“This round, closed during a global pandemic, is a vote of confidence in our dual vision for IoT cybersecurity and on-device intelligence, our technology, and most importantly, our team.”

For investors who contributed to the funding round, Sternum is providing a solution to an extremely high-value problem.

“Authentication, security and real-time monitoring across all IoT devices and applications is a critical problem for manufacturers and consumers,” said Merle Hinrich, founder and chairman of Hinrich Foundation.

“Sternum’s solutions are unique, scalable, and proven. We are delighted to be invested in and supportive of Sternum’s team and technology, which will assist in bringing trust and dependability to industries implementing IoT.”

Sternum will use the money raised in the funding round to expand its research and engineering staff in order to enhance its capabilities.


Read more: IoT security: Why California’s weak password ban won’t solve the problem