Greater Zurich Area has a new unicorn

Acronis has raised 147 million dollars in funding, in a round led by the American investment bank Goldman Sachs. The funding brings the Schaffhausen company’s value to more than one billion dollars – making it a new unicorn in the Greater Zurich Area. The news follows Tech Tour Growth 50’s February announcement that Acronis was a potential unicorn.  

With the funding, Acronis plans to drive its growth in the USA; expand its development teams in Singapore, Bulgaria and Arizona; and build new data centers – with enough funding left over for potential acquisitions. 

Acronis was founded in Singapore in 2003 but has been headquartered in Schaffhausen since 2008. It employs more than 1,400 people in 18 countries, and its cyber security solutions are used by more than five million users and 500,000 companies. Among them is Google, which exploits Acronis’ expertise in its anti-virus program VirusTotal. 

“We are excited to invest in Acronis at this stage of rapid growth,” said Holger Staude, vice president of Goldman Sachs Private Capital Investing. “The traditional backup and data protection market is being disrupted by Acronis Cyber Protection, an innovative solution delivered efficiently through a vast channel of service providers.”