Tech

Cybersecurity company Tenable shoots up 31.5% to a $2.7 billion market cap on its first day of trading — here's what the CEO said about it

Tenable IPO Nasdaq Amit Yoran
Tenable CEO Amit Yoran (left) and Nasdaq VP Joe Brantuk Tenable
Read in app
  • The 16-year-old cybersecurity company Tenable held its IPO on Thursday.
  • Shares shot up 31.5% by the close of markets, which values the company around $2.7 billion. 
  • Tenable now trades on the NASDAQ under the ticker TENB. 

Tenable spiked 31.5% on its first day trading as a public company, giving the Maryland-based cybersecurity company a market cap of $2.7 billion when the closing bell rang.

The company listed on the NASDAQ on Thursday under the ticker "TENB."

"For us, we see a future where cybersecurity and understanding cyber risk is more foundational than it's ever been," Tenable CEO Amit Yoran told Business Insider. "Going public is simply a bigger stage and an opportunity to execute on this vision with a much louder platform."

Tenable describes itself as a "cyber exposure" company, and sells a Software-as-a-Service product to detect security vulnerabilities, as well as a platform to enable chief information security officers to measure the risk faced by their networks.

The company brought in $187.7 million in revenue in 2017, up 59.9% from $124 million in revenue in 2016. Like many newly-public tech companies these days, Tenable is not yet profitable.  

Though founded in 2002, the company gained notoriety in 2015 after raising a mega-sized $250 million series B from investors at Insight Venture Partners and Accel. That round valued the company at $550 million, according to PitchBook, and at the time was considered to be the largest-ever cybersecurity funding round to date .

The IPO was cause for celebration at the company, which had 1,054 employees as of March. More than 80 of those staffers from around the world made their way to New York City for company's IPO, said Yoran, who joined the company as CEO in early 2017. 

"We did a reception for folks who are in town, and we're doing a global event Monday of next week at each of our different offices," Yoran said. "When you're a tech company, your assets are your people. So we think it's an incredible accomplishment for the team." 

Read next

Becky Peterson was formerly a tech features correspondent focused on long-form profiles and investigations into the most interesting people and companies at the intersection of technology and finance.She's broken news on major tech stories including Palantir's work on Project Maven, Peter Thiel's $18 million estate in Miami (which was once featured on MTV's 'The Real World'), Jeffrey Epstein's tour of SpaceX, and Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi's insistence that employees take "the D."Previously, she covered enterprise tech and tech investment banking with a focus on M&A, IPO and venture capital deals in San Francisco. She graduated from New York University with a master's degree in media, culture and communication with an emphasis on technology and society. ExpertiseSilicon Valley, Venture Capital, Investment Banking, Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine MaxwellPopular articlesInside the turmoil at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, where employees say divorce, Epstein, and vaccines have left some staffers polishing their résumésThe secret life of Ian Osborne, the shadowy 38-year-old cofounder of Chamath Palihapitiya's SPAC who has built the ultimate black book of billionairesSilicon Valley VCs are at war with the 'far left radicals' running CaliforniaInside the life of Ghislaine Maxwell's secret husband, a once-high-flying tech entrepreneur backed by Eric Schmidt who is now a central figure in one of the country's most high-profile legal casesRent the Runway CEO Jennifer Hyman, one of the most successful female founders, is fighting to save her companyJeffrey Epstein set Elon Musk's brother up with a girlfriend in effort to get close to the Tesla founder, sources sayA drunken late-night assault allegation has roiled the secretive world of Mark Zuckerberg's private family office. Personal aides are speaking out about claims that household staff endured sexual harassment and racism from their colleagues.