Modern Application And Access Networking Company NS1 Closes $40 Million

By Dan Anderson ● Jul 15, 2020
  • NS1 — a leader in modern application and access networking — announced that it has raised $40 million in Series D

NS1 — a leader in modern application and access networking — announced that it has raised $40 million in Series D funding led by Energy Impact Partners (EIP) with participation from existing investors. Including this round of funding, the company has raised a total of $125 million.

And the investment will support the company’s continued innovation and development of modern foundational technologies that power the connected economy.

Even though IT modernization trends were well established, recent events have showcased the importance of high-performing and resilient applications along with the critical infrastructure technology that supports them. And with legacy internet and networking solutions under strain during the COVID-19 pandemic, NS1’s software-defined solutions have provided the flexibility and scalability for keeping its customers resilient and people connecting, streaming, innovating, and moving the world forward.

The past investments from Cisco and Dell Technologies Capital created opportunities to extend NS1’s market reach and magnify the company’s distribution channel. And the most recent round of funding — which represents a significant increase in valuation for the company — will allow NS1 to more aggressively invest in product innovation, and expand the company’s engineering capacity so it can continue to develop market-leading solutions that power the connected economy.

NS1 had started 2020 with a rapid influx of new customers. And in the first quarter, new customer bookings grew 159% year over year. Now the company serves over 600 enterprise customers, including many of the largest brands like LinkedIn, Dropbox, Salesforce, The Guardian, TomTom, and Pitney Bowes. 

Shawn Cherian, partner at EIP, will be joining NS1’s Board of Directors in connection with the funding round. And Cherian said that EIP’s investment in NS1 represents a growing appetite from the firm’s limited partners to integrate with category-leading companies and invest in enterprise SaaS solutions. 

Key Quotes:

“There is heightened urgency to expedite IT modernization. Five-year projects are being condensed to one year, and the only way to deliver on these aggressive timelines is by unlocking leverage in foundational application and networking infrastructure. This additional investment at a time of rapid growth at NS1 helps us capitalize on the market opportunity to meet the escalating demand for the modern foundational technologies used by every business, enabling them to quickly adapt to changing environments, more effectively control costs, and deliver reliable, secure, and exceptional user experiences.”

— Kris Beevers, co-founder and CEO at NS1

“The hyper-connectivity of today’s world has made IT transformation a business imperative. Meeting this demand depends on reliable IT operations and trusted technology partnerships. Working with NS1 to implement its Managed DNS has helped us build a resilient, more secure and high performing network that improves customer experience, IT efficiency, and application reliability.”

— Bask Iyer, chief information officer and chief digital transformation officer at VMware

“As enterprises shift to the cloud and their environments become more complex, fundamental infrastructure solutions, like those provided by NS1, will play a critical role in allowing companies to expand more effectively. NS1 is the leading next-generation DNS platform and has defined the standard for performance, resilience, and scale, which will continue to have broad applicability for internet services and solutions across verticals.”

— Shawn Cherian, partner at EIP