Case Study: Quorum Cyber

Our executives aim to build a strong working relationship with the management team of each company we invest in. It is this active portfolio management that is crucial to driving value creation. 

“We weren’t just looking for money. We were looking for a true partner…somebody who can go on that journey with us, and Maven has been unique at that.” Federico Charosky, CEO at Quorum Cyber.

Watch Federico and David Milroy, Partner at Maven, discuss their proactive partnership which ultimately led to a profitable exit earlier this month, delivering a 6.5x return in just 18 months.

Frederico Charosky: We are a cyber security firm, we do two basic services, we do pre-emptive services, trying to get people to be more secure or defensive and we do reactive services, so if something goes wrong we’re there to help and recover as well.

Cyber security at the moment is on top of the agenda for most boards, regardless of company size or industry. There’s been a dramatic increase in cyber attacks that have caused real damage to organisations and nations across the world, so whereas before it might’ve been perceived as a luxury or as a bit of an insurance policy, I think right now boards have this at the top of the agenda.

David Milroy: The attraction of a business-like Quorum was initially the sector it operates in. I think the latest numbers from the British government are that we have a market worth about £9 billion for just the UK, and that’s grown and more than doubled in the last few years, it’s a really important sector and it is growing rapidly. I think everybody is clear of the threats, not just professionals working in the sector, people on the street know exactly how important this space is. They read in the news just how many attacks there have been and how costly those attacks are.

Frederico Charosky: By design, one of the reasons we ended up partnering with Maven is that we weren’t just looking for money, we wanted a true partner. We can do the technology all day long, we are cyber specialists, but we don’t know how to grow and run businesses so we wanted a partner that was able to give us helps with all these other areas such as operations and finance improvements. They know more about building and running companies than we will ever learn so finding a partner like Maven that was able to plug into all our needs as we grow was important as we need somebody to go on that journey with us and Maven’s been unique at that.

David Milroy: The investment has primarily been deployed to support sales and marketing side of the business, it’s always typical to get good salespeople. There’s also been investment in the product road map to ensure that we have a cutting-edge solution and then also to invest in things like the Microsoft partnerships, ensuring that we have done as much as we can to bridge that partnership with Microsoft.

Frederico Charosky: I learned quite a lot through the process of raising funds and going through that advisory process of what we wanted. We went into it knowing the basics, we wanted money and then what became obvious was we were looking for a partner, we wanted somebody that was actively involved not removed. We wanted somebody that had experience across industries because we were quite interested in how to benchmark ourselves against different parts of different industries and how to be better as a whole. So we started looking for something very simple and an economic proposal we ended up looking at was for a truly diverse partner. That’s really what led us to maven, we loved the idea they had a diverse portfolio, they’re not just a technology investment firm, they were working across industries, across regions, and we really liked the human approach. Maven are great at helping you think through your options. This has been so educational for me because they bring all that experience with businesses that have succeeded or failed. They bring a perspective into the conversation that I don’t have, I can talk about Cyber, but to be able to have somebody like that help me plan and replan as we meet the reality on the road, is super important.

I really cannot articulate enough how different the experience was from what I perceived the experience would be. It is a positive journey. It’s a positive partnership that you develop, particularly with Maven. My experience has been nothing but spectacular. So, if you’re afraid that the typical fears that are discussed that somebody might take over your company, that they might redirect the objectives, the strategy, they might replace the top management. It is nothing like that, they’ve been nothing but a great partner to us.