Here are some of the most prominent venture capital and merger and acquisition news items from May. If you’d like SDxCentral to report on your company’s VC or M&A activity in our monthly Money Moves section, or if you have any tips on that activity, please send the information to Dan Meyer ([email protected]).

AT&T Sheds Misbegotten Media Assets, Doubles 5G Buildout

AT&T is getting out of the media and entertainment business and vaulting its 5G deployment activity.

The company is spinning off and combining its WarnerMedia business with Discovery in a bid to completely rid itself of entertainment assets it accumulated during a three-year period starting in 2015. AT&T closed its acquisition of DirecTV for $67 billion in 2015 and finalized a deal to acquire Time Warner for $85 billion in 2018.

The company’s desire to become a juggernaut in both connectivity and entertainment was short-lived and burdened the company with a mountain of debt. The deals brought AT&T’s total debt to a record high of $166 billion in 2018, a liability that hindered investments in its wireless, fiber, and entertainment business units.

Cisco Scoops Up Kenna Security, Sedona Systems

Cisco is acquiring Kenna Security and will combine the security software vendor’s risk-based vulnerability management technology with its SecureX platform.

The companies did not disclose financial terms of the deal, which they expect to close in Cisco’s fourth quarter of fiscal 2021. The 11-year-old company has raised $98.3 million with its most recent funding round, a Series D in September 2019, bringing in $48 million.

Cisco also continued its optical networking conquests with the acquisition of Sedona Systems to support its routed optical networking platform.

The announcement comes after a hard-fought battle to acquire optical networking vendor Acacia for $4.5 billion earlier this year, which produces, among other things, optical pluggable modules and digital signal processors (DSP).

More May Money Moves

Aryaka Networks expanded its secure access service edge (SASE) platform with the acquisition of German cloud security vendor Secucloud for an undisclosed sum.

ServiceNow signed an agreement to acquire observability provider Lightstep for an undisclosed amount.

Cybersecurity provider Imperva announced plans to acquire API security vendor CloudVector for an undisclosed amount.

Okta closed on its $6.5 billion acquisition of application identity platform provider Auth0.

Apollo Global Management entered into an agreement to acquire Verizon Media for $5 billion. Verizon will retain a 10% stake in the company.

Sectigo acquired website security protection and monitoring vendor SiteLock and automated content management system vulnerability scanning and patching solutions provider Patchman for undisclosed amounts.

Equinix priced $2.6 billion principal amount of notes, including $1 billion of green bonds in its third green bond offering.

Managed detection and response provider Huntress announced a $40 million Series B investment round led by JMI Equity.

Forcepoint acquired intelligent remote browser isolation technology provider Cyberinc for an undisclosed amount.

Mavenir agreed to a $500 million minority equity investment from Koch Strategic Platforms.

Data security company Dasera announced $6 million in seed funding. It has now raised $9 million in total funding.

HelpSystems acquired vulnerability assessment and management software vendor Beyond Security. It also acquired cybersecurity vendor Agari.

Cisco acquired privately-held Socio Labs, which offers an event technology platform that provides event organizers with tools to host in-person, virtual, or hybrid events.

Ericsson announced a $97.4 million settlement agreement with Nokia tied to a U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) investigation into Ericsson’s violations of the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).

Snyk acquired FossID, which is a software composition analysis tool that scans code for open source licenses and vulnerabilities.

Code security vendor BluBracket raised $12 million in a Series A funding round. It has raised $19.5 million to date.

Identity and security management platform provider Authomize closed a $16 million Series A funding round. The company has raised $22 million in total funding.

Zensar is acquiring data and digital engineering firm M3bi for an undisclosed amount.

ThreatLocker raised $20 million in Series B funding, bringing the company’s total funding to $24.5 million.

Styra raised $40 million in a Series B funding round.

IBM is acquiring Waeg, a Salesforce Consulting Partner in Europe, for an undisclosed amount.

IDC acquired Metri, an independent IT benchmarking, sourcing, and performance measurement firm, for an undisclosed amount.

Cynerio, a provider of healthcare IoT cybersecurity and asset management solutions, secured $30 million in Series B funding.

Splunk signed an agreement to acquire TruSTAR, a San Francisco-based cloud-native security company providing a data-centric intelligence platform, for an undisclosed amount.

API security vendor 42Crunch secured $17 million in a Series A investment.

ThoughtSpot entered into an agreement to acquire Diyotta for an undisclosed amount.

Sumo Logic closed on its acquisition of security orchestration, automation, and response (SOAR) vendor DF Labs.

Betacom secured $15 million in funding from private investors including Braxton Carter, past CFO of T-Mobile.

Salt Security closed a $70 million Series C funding round. The security vendor has raised $131 million to date.

DataDome announced a $35 million Series B investment round.

Legal and compliance technology company Relativity acquired Text IQ, an artificial intelligence (AI) company applying AI to identify sensitive data.

Network performance management vendor LiveAction acquired CounterFlow AI, a network detection and response (NDR) provider.

JupiterOne announced a Series B funding round that pushed its total secured investments to nearly $50 million.

Firewall vendor CrowdSec announced a $5 million seed round from Breega.

Supply chain risk management software vendor Avetta acquired Pegasus, a provider of worker competency management software and services. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

CircleCI announced a $100 million Series F funding round.

Edge cloud service provider Zenlayer closed a $50 million Series C financing round, which pushed its total financing to $90 million.

Cloud software and data analytics provider Axtria received a $150 million growth investment from Bain Capital Tech Opportunities.

Perforce Software acquired 21 Labs, an AI-based mobile testing provider that helps businesses deliver quality software faster. Financial terms of the deal were not released.

Cortex secured $2.5 million in seed funding.

Netlify acquired FeaturePeek, a Y Combinator and Matrix Partners-backed startup that enables developer teams to preview frontend content. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Airbyte raised $26 million in a Series A funding round.

Kaloom announced that as a part of new financing, Alternative Capital Group has become the majority shareholder of Kaloom. The new funding brings the total amount raised by Kaloom to $32.5 million.

Invoca acquired DialogTech, an AI-powered call tracking and analytics solution for marketers, in a combined cash and stock deal.

Embedded billing platform provider Resolve raised $60 million in funding.

Security company Tessian raised $65 million in Series C venture capital funding, pushing its total funding to more than $120 million.

Fraud prevention provider Forter raised $300 million in Series F funding.

CSG acquired Tango Telecom, a supplier of convergent policy control and messaging solutions. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Digital experience analytics provider Contentsquare completed a $500 Million Series E funding round.