DataGrail Raises $5.2M As Data Regulation Goes Local

San Francisco’s DataGrail, a company that helps businesses stay compliant with data regulations, once cited European companies as its main customer. About a year later, in light of more domestic data regulation laws like the California Consumer Privacy Act, co-founder and CEO Daniel Barber tells Crunchbase News that conversation has turned local.

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And the company just raised $5.2 million in a Series A round led by Cloud Apps Capital to help cater to this shifting customer base.

“A lot of conversations we’re having today are centered on the U.S. consumer, and all the businesses who had to cater to that,” Barber said. DataGrail’s total funding to date is $9.2 million.

Other investors in the round include Okta Ventures and Basis Set Ventures. This was one of Okta Ventures first investments, after closing its first fund about 4 months ago.

Monty Gray, Okta’s senior vice president of corporate development said “we look forward to partnering with the company to help our joint customers navigate the increasingly complicated regulatory landscape,” in a statement provided to Crunchbase News.

Compliance is becoming a domestic mindset. For example, the California Consumer Privacy Act will take effect January 2020. Nevada enacted an “online privacy law requiring businesses to offer consumers a right to opt-out of the sale of their personal information,” a law website states. Nevada’s law will be effective Oct 1, 2019. We might see the New York Privacy Act soon, as well.

DataGrail works with enterprise companies that want their customers to be able to move or delete their data on demand. The 30-employee company integrates with more than 100 infrastructure systems, from Salesforce to Amazon Web Services (AWS). It lets businesses “continuously comply with data privacy regulations,” the statement said.

For example, if a JetBlue customer wants to delete all their data so they can move to another airline, JetBlue has to do that.

Barber said that it’s not good for companies to lose customers, but legal pressures are forcing them to make it an option. While DataGrail first worked with enterprise companies, Barber said it’s finding interest from customer-facing companies.

A company like Uber, for example, has a lot of customers so it has a “higher risk,” according to Barber.

“They have a higher, higher risk especially for privacy regulations and a significant number of consumers,” on its platform, he said. Barber also said that DataGrail’s customers have tripled in less than a year, and include Databricks, G2, and Intercom.

Barber mentioned how Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)  “was the forefront of starting this social economic trend.” The transition to those beyond the European footprint, he claims, is just beginning.

Illustration: Li-Anne Dias.