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Passbolt’s $8 million seed round reflects its ambition to establish itself as the go-to password management solution for small and midsize businesses (SMBs) while aiming to break into the enterprise market. Unlike consumer-oriented tools such as Bitwarden and 1Password, Passbolt focuses on offering a collaborative, secure, and controlled password management platform tailored for team-based use.
Passbolt allows granular access control, auditing capabilities, and the ability to self-host behind a company’s firewall. While popular tools like KeePass enable credential sharing through static files, Passbolt offers features like role-based access, password expiration, and native apps, based partially on KeePass, Passbolt builds on the strengths of open source while addressing its limitations, ensuring transparency and flexibility.
The team is planning to introduce passkey management and expand into Privileged Access Management (PAM) to rival services like CyberArk.A free self-hosted community edition, a $49/month Pro version, and a hosted SaaS version starting at $54/month make it accessible to a wide range of users.Over 38,000 teams use the free version, and 2,000 pay for the Pro or SaaS editions.75% of users opt for self-hosting, demonstrating the demand for control and flexibility.
The company achieved profitability in mid-2024 but raised funding to accelerate feature development and address user demands.The Series A round was led by Airbridge Equity Partners, with participation from several existing and new investors, including prominent angel investors. The funding underscores confidence in Passbolt’s ability to challenge legacy solutions and expand its reach across industries.
Passbolt’s innovative approach positions it well to meet the growing need for secure, team-centric password management, particularly in a world of distributed and agile workforces. Its focus on SMBs with an eye toward enterprise clients signals that it’s ready to scale further in the competitive cybersecurity market.
