Btech Consortium Fund Invests in DefenseStorm to Protect Community Banks

Existing Investor Participation in Raise Shows Confidence in Company Direction

ALPHARETTA, Ga.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--DefenseStorm, the leading provider of cyber risk management solutions and co-managed services to financial institutions, recently completed a Series C-1 raise. The round was led by a number of existing investor partners, including Georgian, Curql, and Live Oak Ventures. Joining the round is new investor the Btech Consortium Fund, a group of community banks leveraging technology to better serve their customers.

Community banks are innovating their technologies and services to meet customer demand for accessibility and convenience, improve operational efficiency, and compete better against larger banks. While needed for growth, innovation creates risk, with cybercriminals poised to exploit the vulnerabilities exposed by change. All banks, regardless of their size, must proactively manage cyber risk, which includes pre-emptive and continuous action to assess and address risks caused by innovation.

“DefenseStorm and the Btech Consortium Fund are committed to providing community banks access to the latest technologies, offering a comprehensive cyber risk approach that ensures they can protect their assets, customers, and reputations,” said Steve Soukup, CEO of DefenseStorm. “Our integrated technology platform is purposefully “Built for Banking”, meaning it is designed to meet all the demanding requirements and regulations that are unique to banks. And our team of highly trained cyber experts provides the much-needed resources that many smaller banks can struggle to hire and retain. It’s a true partnership, ensuring community banks can effectively respond to the constantly evolving world of cyber threats.”

Working together, the Btech Consortium Fund and DefenseStorm are building a community of trust, so all banks can grow and thrive together. It involves bringing together financial institutions, business partners, government agencies, and others to share and act on incidents, making the industry better as a whole. It’s a concerted effort to make communities a better place by putting a stop to threat actors that hold businesses hostage with ransomware or steal an individual’s credit card.

“We are honored to invest in DefenseStorm”, says Kevin Covert, Managing Director at the Btech Consortium Fund, “As community banks rapidly deploy modern technology to streamline efficiencies and innovate, we believe DefenseStorm’s products will prove critical for achieving security and compliance. We are recommending DefenseStorm to all our bank consortium members and the hundreds of community banks with whom we communicate.”

About DefenseStorm

DefenseStorm provides an integrated platform of cyber risk assessment, governance, security, and fraud solutions that ensure financial institutions achieve and maintain cyber risk readiness. The only system specifically built for banking, it accounts for all the daunting challenges, regulations, and technology requirements financial institutions face. Their intelligent data engine, GRID ACTIVE, ensures real-time access, analysis, and action on all critical threat data. The Cyber Threat Surveillance Operations (CTS Ops) team provides access to managed resources 24x7x365, delivering the help and expertise needed by financial institutions. For more information visit: https://defensestorm.com/company/about-us/

About the Btech Consortium Fund

The Btech Consortium Fund is a partnership between U.S. community banks, Elizabeth Park Capital Management, and Strandview Capital. The mission of the consortium is to empower community banks through technology to better compete with larger national banks, become less reliant on legacy core technology, and to better serve their customers. The banks in our consortium are tech-forward, high-performing banks. They have joined forces to gain market leverage and a competitive advantage through insights into emerging bank technology, access to new vendor relationships, access to new vendor relationships, and sharing of technology best practices among bank peers. For more information visit: https://btechconsortium.com/