[Funding alert] Compliance automation startup for SaaS companies, Sprinto, raises $10M led by Elevation Capital

Sprinto, a Bengaluru-based compliance automation platform for software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies, on Wednesday announced that it has raised $10 million in Series A funding led by Elevation Capitalwith participation from Accel and Blume Ventures.

In an official statement, the startup said the funding will be used for team expansion across key functions and R&D to ensure long-term growth. Sprinto will also open its first North American office, in Utah, by this quarter’s end.

Earlier, in January 2020, the company had raised $1.5 million in seed funding from Blume Ventures.

“Sprinto solves a critical business need in a growing market. It has created a world-class product which is already emerging as the compliance automation platform of choice for SaaS companies and generating tremendous customer acclaim,” said Deepak Gaur, Partner, Elevation Capital.

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Publicly launched in mid 2021, Sprinto helps SaaS companies obtain compliances, such as SOC 2, ISO27001, GDPR, HIPAA etc., in a quick and hassle-free manner.

Obtaining these compliances helps Sprinto customers close enterprise deals and pass vendor security assessments easily. The startup was co-founded by Girish Redekar and Raghuveer Kancherla, who have been colleagues for 15 years.  

Developed by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), SOC 2 (Systems and Organisations Controls 2) is a set of compliance requirements for companies, especially service organisations, which use cloud-based storage for their customers’ data. It is based on five core trust services criteria of security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy. SOC 2 audits have become essential in regulatory oversight, vendor management programs, internal governance, and risk management. 

“As compliance with these standards, including SOC 2, is becoming a critical business need, most companies must rely on infosec consultants and auditors to get the necessary certifications,” said Sprinto Co-founder Girish Redekar. 

“With a consultant, companies would take around 3-4 months to be ready for SOC 2 assessment. Using Sprinto’s compliance automation platform, companies can complete the SOC 2 readiness assessment in just days. This levels the playing field, helping smaller companies lacking the resources of larger firms,” Girish added.

As enterprise SaaS continues to grow exponentially, businesses are increasingly relying on compliances like SOC 2 to get assurance that their SaaS vendors keep their data safe. And SaaS vendors need SOC 2 compliance to close high-ticket deals. 

Currently, obtaining and maintaining SOC 2 compliance takes 300+ hours of work each year, as per the company.

Sprinto’s SaaS platform claims to make this process 10x faster. It helps clients create a real time monitoring system that provides visibility into the processes and policies governed by compliance checklists, tracks the status of these systems, and alerts relevant teams if a system is not operating within the required baseline limits or in case of any policy violations. 

According to Sprinto Co-founder Raghuveer Kancherla, “A decade ago, only large enterprises demanded SOC 2 compliances. With the changes mandated by the AICPA in 2018, all SaaS businesses, irrespective of size, need to be SOC 2 compliant and are required to collect SOC 2 reports from their critical vendors. Thus, being SOC 2 compliant has become a revenue concern for SaaS businesses of all sizes."

"Recognising this growing need, Sprinto aims to become the infosec OS of choice for SaaS service providers. It’s creating a new product category that’s fundamentally different from existing automation tools", Raghuveer added.

Raghuveer also added that Sprinto is focused on delivering outcomes, not just automation. This is ingrained into the team’s design, outlook, internal processes, and culture.

Since its website launch in June 2021, Sprinto has already acquired hundreds of customers, including enterprise-level accounts as HP and Hackerrank. The startup claims to have doubled its ARR over the last 10 weeks alone.