Montreal Tech Watch

I’m not even sure if “raises” is the right word here, due to the unsually high amount (an understatement), but RadialPoint announced last week a $98 million investment by a private equity and buyout firm TA Associates. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, although it’s certain this is not a complete buyout and TA had in exchange a minority stake (<49% in the company).

RadialPoint started in the early 2000's as Zero Knowledge Systems, with the intention of providing privacy and security management services with the rise of the Internet. Then the tech bubble came, and the company reinvented itself, and now provides complete solutions and packages for Internet service providers' customers. If you are a Bell subscriber, they are the ones for instance who package the anti-virus software and all other home software aimed at easing and adding value to the user's experience. RadialPoint is also active in Europe and the US, and there are plans to market the service worldwide. Such services are essential to ISPs since if a security problem happens on their computer, most customers' reactions is to blame the ISP even in cases when they are responsible.

This is great news for the company, and even greater news for the founders, the Hill family. Before the news of the funding, the original team (well at least 2 of the 3) were also featured in the Report on Business magazine, in early Sep. (from here)