$77.5 billion in cybersecurity M&As in 2021

The cybersecurity sector is booming financially, driven by rapidly growing needs as our societies become increasingly digital. Fundraising rounds and mergers and acquisitions are regularly breaking records.

Momentum Cyber’s latest annual report on cybersecurity financing reveals a total of more than 1,000 funding rounds in 2021 (compared to 728 in 2020), 86 of which exceeded $100 million. Five companies—KnowBe4, DarkTrace, SentinelOne, Riskified, and Forgerock—went public, raising an average of $467 million.

But the most spectacular growth took place in mergers and acquisitions, with a total of $77.5 billion in 2021, compared to $19.7 billion in 2020. This amount is notably driven by 14 mergers or acquisitions exceeding one billion dollars.

The most significant were the acquisition of Proofpoint by Thoma Bravo for $12.3 billion, the merger of NortonLifeLock and Avast PLC for $8.4 billion, the acquisition of Auth0 by Okta for $6.4 billion, and the purchase of McAfee’s Enterprise business by Symphony Technology Group for $4 billion.

The beginning of 2022 confirms this trend, with the possible acquisition of Mandiant by Microsoft and with Cisco’s $20 billion offer for Splunk.