QUALYS Raises $8.4M from Bessemer Venture Partners and VeriSign

Sunnyvale, Calif. — April 24, 2000 — Qualys Corporation, a leader in online network security services, today announced it has raised $8.4M from Bessemer Venture Partners, a leading national venture capital firm, and VeriSign, Inc. (Nasdaq: VRSN), the leading provider of Internet trust services. Qualys offers the first online security service to provide organizations with an outside-in, or hacker, view of network vulnerabilities-graphically identifying security exposures, immediately evaluating risks, and continuously re-assessing security issues. With 57% of responding companies currently reporting assaults on their Internet connections (Computer Crime and Security Institute, 1999 Study), Qualys services provide ISPs, telecommunications companies, security consultants and end customers with immediate value via on-demand online monitoring of corporate information assets.

“The Qualys offering provides enterprises with a unique, real-time security audit of their network infrastructure, presented in a graphically-rich format,” said Anil Pereira, vice president of VeriSign’s Internet Services Group. “With this offering, customers will have an indispensable tool for analyzing their corporate networks and to ensure that corporate information assets are adequately protected.”

Qualys’ flagship solution, QualysGuard™, is the first online service to provide businesses with continuous network security audits to detect and assess Internet vulnerabilities. Provided on a subscription basis, QualysGuard requires only a few clicks via a standard browser for a business to map its entire network infrastructure in a matter of minutes, clearly visualize security vulnerabilities, probe for security holes, and receive a graphic and comprehensive diagnosis of security problems. Because QualysGuard functionality is delivered entirely over the Internet, there is no need for customers to deploy and learn complex security monitoring software or to incur ongoing maintenance costs.

“Qualys is the first company to assess security readiness from the hacker’s perspective, offering e-businesses daily, customized, state-of-the-art direction on securing their information assets,” said David Cowan, managing partner of Bessemer Venture Partners, and a board member of Qualys. “Rather than sell expensive, hard-to-deploy products, Qualys has followed VeriSign’s example of offering a dynamic service that customers can use immediately to get their businesses safely online.”

Management team and new board members
Qualys is headquartered in Silicon Valley and is led by a team of veteran professionals from the network security, software and Internet industries, including co-founders Gilles Samoun, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), and Philippe Langlois, Chief Technology Officer. Mr. Samoun was most recently CEO of MediaPath Technologies and Vice President and General Manager of European Operations at Verity. Mr. Langlois was founder of Worldnet, France’s first ISP, and Intrinsec, a leading computer security and intrusion detection consultancy.

Qualys also announced that Mr. Cowan of Bessemer Venture Partners and Philippe Courtot, CEO and Chairman of Signio, Inc., which was recently acquired by VeriSign, have joined Mr. Samoun on the Qualys Board of Directors. Prior to Signio, Mr. Courtot was President and CEO of Verity, Inc. and before that headed up cc.Mail. Qualys Raises $8.4M from Bessemer Venture Partners and VeriSign.

About Bessemer Venture Partners
Bessemer Venture Partners, with offices in Menlo Park, Boston and New York, is the leading national venture capital firm focused on early-stage e-commerce and communications investments. BVP invests more than a quarter of a billion dollars a year, carrying on a tradition of hands-on, active venture investing that has continued since 1911. Many of the most trusted Internet brands, such as VeriSign, Ciena, Mindspring, eToys, Keynote, Register.com, Flycast, Tumbleweed, e-Steel, Telocity, Verio, Hotjobs, Veritas and SciQuest, have chosen BVP as their venture partner during their early stage of development.

About Qualys

With more than 2,000 subscribers ranging from small businesses to multinational corporations, Qualys has become the leader in on demand vulnerability management and policy compliance. The company allows security managers to strengthen the security of their networks effectively, conduct automated security audits and ensure compliance with internal policies and external regulations. Qualys’ on demand technology offers customers significant economic advantages, requiring no capital outlay or infrastructure to deploy and manage. Its distributed scanning capabilities and unprecedented scalability make it ideal for large, distributed organisations. Hundreds of large companies have deployed Qualys on a global scale, including AXA, DuPont, Hershey Foods, ICI Ltd, Novartis, Sodexho, Standard Chartered Bank and many others. Qualys is headquartered in Redwood City, California, with European offices in France, Germany and the U.K., and Asian representatives in Japan, Singapore, Australia, Korea and the Republic of China. For more information, please visit www.qualys.com.

Qualys, the Qualys logo and QualysGuard are proprietary trademarks of Qualys, Inc. All other products or names may be trademarks of their respective companies.

Media Contact:
Tami Casey
Qualys
media@qualys.com