IDEA Fund Partners has invested a second time in a year in Virginia-based Distil, which touts itself as the “first cloud-based, intelligent gatekeeper for website content protection.”
Distil, founded by graduates of N.C. State, has raised another $1.8 million in financing with IDEA Fund among the syndicate making the investment.
FF Venture Capital led the round. Other backers include Correlation Ventures, CIT, Piedmont RIA, Cloud Power Fund and TechStars.
IDEA Fund participated in a $400,000 round Distil raised in early 2012.
“Companies don’t realize that their websites are being attacked everyday. That they are losing money and sensitive information to web scraping and bot attacks.” says John Frankel, a partner at FF VC, who joined Distil’s board as part of the deal. “Disti.it has proven with top companies, such as cult of mac, that their product can effectively block these attacks, stop the loss of data and enhance revenues.”
Based in Falls Church, Va., Distil was launched by a quartet of entrepreneurs, including three graduates of N.C. State University.
Rami Essaid, the chief executive officer, Engin Akyol, the vice president of engineering, and Andrew Stein, vice president of development, attended NCSU. The other co-founder is Sean Harmer, head of business development.
Distil touts itself as a “Content Protection Network.” It also operates as a cloud-based company, providing its offerings through a software-as-a-service model. Distil’s founders say the firm is the “first cloud-based, intelligent gatekeeper for website content.”
