Shift5 Draws Investors, Raises $33M in Funding to Unlock Onboard Data in Commercial and Military Fleets and Weapon Systems
Rosslyn, VA, June 07, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Shift5, the onboard data company, today announced it has raised $33 million in additional financing, bringing its Series B round to $83 million. Led by Moore Strategic Ventures, industry stalwarts across defense and commercial aerospace industries including Booz Allen Hamilton's corporate venture capital arm, Booz Allen Ventures, and JetBlue Ventures, as well as Teamworthy Ventures, participated in the round, bringing the company's total venture funding to $108 million. The fundraise comes amid significant business momentum; in the last year Shift5 more than doubled its annual recurring revenue (ARR), more than doubled its number of customers across Department of Defense (DoD) and commercial aerospace and rail sectors, and grew the rate of its platform deployments on commercial and DoD vehicles and weapon systems by 1,275%.
Fleet assets are composed of thousands of operational technology (OT) components, each emitting valuable data that can be collected and transformed into useful intelligence, but operators have been locked out. The Shift5 platform unlocks onboard OT data and provides modern observability into onboard assets, enabling commercial operators to increase efficiencies and improve the safety of their fleets while helping DoD operators boost fleet readiness, lethality, and survivability. In the last year, the Shift5 platform processed more than 37 billion messages from its deployments, and identified more than 20 billion unique events occurring at the serial bus level. From these events, Shift5 flagged 1.8 million violations. Among these violations, Shift5 elevated six critical alerts that required action and led to three assets moving from a non-compliant to a compliant status.
"Gaining observability at the onboard OT level can transform not just real-time operations, but the resilience and safety of the commercial and military fleets that underpin national defense and the U.S. economy," said Shift5 CEO and Co-Founder Josh Lospinoso. "The work Shift5 does is foundational – the endless data we capture, add context to, analyze and provide insights around creates a wholly new paradigm for fleet operators and maintainers to make decisions. And in the context of innovations and modern threats, this level of specificity is needed. Our expanded round not only validates the successes of the Shift5 business, but will help us support overall safer, more reliable, and resilient commercial transportation and military fleets."
Shift5 is currently supporting multiple branches and combatant commands of the U.S. military, including: U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, U.S. Air Force, U.S. Space Force, and U.S. Special Operations Command. In the last year, Shift5 also:
- Secured a 92% retention rate with in-production customers across the DoD and commercial sectors
- Captured more than 8,500 operational hours from commercial and military fleets and weapon systems
- Increased the size of its deployment in a Fortune 500 commercial airline by 25%
- Achieved its first cross-platform Authority to Operate (ATO) Certification from the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD)
Booz Allen's corporate venture capital arm, Booz Allen Ventures, made a strategic investment in Shift5 as part of the current funding round and is aligned to the firm's National Cyber business, with focus on outpacing adversaries and protecting U.S. strategic advantage by enhancing weapon systems readiness.
"Booz Allen and Shift5 will together unlock real value for clients in the civilian, federal and military spaces to detect threats, lower risk vectors, and maintain resilience in a time of heightened competition fueled by emerging technology," said Travis Bales, managing director at Booz Allen Ventures. "The investment by Booz Allen Ventures in Shift5 is just one of our answers to how we can ensure national security, public safety, and economic security, and bolster the country's readiness and resilience."
Shift5 is the only hardware, serial bus, and protocol-agnostic platform that can perform full-take data capture from the components and data buses onboard fleets and weapon systems as well as real-time edge analytics, enabling mission and operational insights, reduced decision latency, and modern onboard observability. The financing will fuel the infrastructure supporting Shift5's rapidly growing commercial and federal businesses as it expands to tackle the challenge of onboard observability and comes a month after Shift5 and JetBlue Airlines announced a partnership to bring cybersecurity and data observability of onboard avionics to commercial aircraft, and the company's first cross-platform Authority to Operate (ATO) Certification from the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), validating the resilience and security of the Shift5 platform.
The extended round caps off operational growth for the company as Shift5 expanded its Arlington-based office footprint and grew its executive team through the appointment of its inaugural General Counsel, Chief Revenue Officer, and Chief People Officer. Shift5 was named a BuiltIn "2023 Best Places to Work" as a Best Startup to Work For in Washington, D.C..
About Shift5
Shift5 is the onboard data company. Created by officers who stood up U.S. Army Cyber Command and pioneered modern weapons system cyber assessments, Shift5 defends commercial transportation systems and military platforms against operational failures and OT cybersecurity risks. Household name aviation companies, U.S. railroads, and fleets within the U.S. military rely on Shift5 to maintain the readiness and availability of today's fleets and tomorrow's next-generation assets. For more information, visit https://shift5.io.
About Moore Strategic Ventures
Moore Strategic Ventures, LLC is the privately held investment company for Louis M. Bacon, Founder and CEO of Moore Capital Management, LP.
About JetBlue Ventures
JetBlue Technology Ventures invests in and partners with early stage startups innovating in the travel, transportation, and hospitality industries. The company prioritizes investments that advance the seamless customer-centric journey; technology powered customer service; the future of operations and maintenance; distribution, loyalty, and revenue management; and evolving regional travel. Founded in 2016, JetBlue Technology Ventures is a wholly-owned subsidiary of JetBlue (NASDAQ:JBLU) and is located in Silicon Valley, California. For more information, visit www.JetBlueVentures.com.
About Booz Allen Hamilton
For more than 100 years, military, government, and business leaders have turned to Booz Allen Hamilton to solve their most complex problems. As a consulting firm with experts in analytics, digital solutions, engineering, and cyber, we help organizations transform. We are a key partner on some of the most innovative programs for governments worldwide and trusted by their most sensitive agencies. We work shoulder-to-shoulder with clients, using a mission-first approach to choose the right strategy and technology to help them realize their vision.
With global headquarters in McLean, Virginia, our firm employs approximately 31,100 people globally as of December 31, 2022, and had revenue of $8.4 billion for the 12 months ended March 31, 2022. To learn more, visit www.boozallen.com. (NYSE:BAH)
Katie Garagozzo Shift5 6508685006 katie@shift5.io