Jasvir Gill founded AlertEnterprise raises $8 Million

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Fremont: AlertEnterprise, provider of software that coordinates physical and IT security to prevent overlaps, has raised $8 million in first round funding, from Opus Capital. The startup, founded by Chief Executive Jasvir Gill, a co-founder and former CEO of Virsa, a maker of software to monitor and enforce business controls across systems and applications, will use the money to market its first products - AlertAccess and Alert Action, which monitor access privileges and geospatial activities. The need for tighter security is especially pressing in industries that are sensitive to physical intrusion, such as utilities, transportation and chemical, Gill said. He recognized the need and the market potential for this type of product when he was at Virsa, but "there was so much happening on the application compliance side, we couldn't get our arms around it," Gill said. Virsa was acquired by SAP AG for reportedly more than $400 million in cash in 2006. Eighteen year old AlertEnterprise should not need further rounds of capital to build a profitable business, Gill said. While he was running Virsa, the company had raised only a single round of $15 million in 2004 from investors such as Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Lightspeed Venture Partners, where Ken Elefant, the Opus general partner in charge of the AlertEnterprise deal, was a senior associate. Elefant kept in close contact with Gill after Virsa's sale to SAP to explore ideas for potential new companies. Opus Capital's roots are at Lightspeed Venture Partners. In addition to Elefant, two of the firm's partners, Carl Showalter and Gill Cogan, were partners at Lightspeed, though neither was on the board at Virsa. Elefant has joined AlertEnterprise's board as a result of the transaction.