Warburg Invests In eSentire for Managed Detection, Response Cybersecurity Services

eSentire, a pure-play managed detection and response (MDR) services provider, has received a "significant equity investment" from private equity firm Warburg Pincus, the company said in a prepared statement. Full terms of the investment were not disclosed.

With the investment, eSentire will expand its technology services to existing customers and reach out to organizations in new markets, the company stated. During meetings with MSSP Alert at the recent Black Hat USA 2017 conference, eSentire also described growing plans to work with MSPs and channel partners.

The investment also will be used to provide liquidity to existing eSentire shareholders, according to the company. In other words, some money is coming off the table. But there's chatter in the industry that Warburg apparently wrote nine-digit check. eSentire declined to comment about the speculative statement.

eSentire Enjoys Record Growth in 2016

The Warburg Pincus equity investment comes on the heels of a record year for eSentire.

Some of eSentire's 2016 performance highlights included:

eSentire is the "largest and most advanced pure-play MDR vendor," Executive Chairman Nick Lantuh said in a prepared statement. The company protects more than $5.7 trillion in corporate assets and continues to explore ways to extend its global reach.

For example, eSentire last month launched esLOG, a logging and event management platform that delivers real-time threat detection and response across network, endpoint and cloud services.

esLOG provides security log aggregation and forensics capabilities to deliver purpose-built log management, eSentire said in a company statement. In addition, esLOG supplements the eSentire Managed Detection and Response service (a 24×7 SOC) to deliver enhanced threat detection, forensic investigation and compliance reporting, the company noted.

Detection and Response Is a Top Security Priority

eSentire could help MSPs and other technology partners capitalize on the rising demand for detection and response services.

Worldwide spending on information security is expected to reach $90 billion in 2017, up 7.6 percent year over year, according to technology research firm Gartner. Also, this figure could top $113 billion by 2020, Gartner stated.

Furthermore, spending on enhancing detection and response capabilities is expected to be a key priority for security buyers through 2020, Gartner indicated in a prepared statement.

"The shift to detection and response approaches spans people, process and technology elements and will drive a majority of security market growth over the next five years," said Sid Deshpande, principal research analyst at Gartner. " sends a clear message that prevention is futile unless it is tied into a detection and response capability."