Proofpoint

Not to be confused with Proofpoint Systems.

Proofpoint, Inc. is an American enterprise cybersecurity company based in Sunnyvale, California that provides software as a service and products for email security, identity threat defense, data loss prevention, electronic discovery, and email archiving.

Proofpoint, Inc.

Proofpoint Headquarters, located in Sunnyvale, California
Company type	Private
Traded as	Nasdaq: PFPT
Industry	Security software
Founded	2002; 23 years ago (2002)
Founder	Eric Hahn
Headquarters	Sunnyvale, California , U.S.
Number of locations	Offices worldwide: Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Japan, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, The Netherlands, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States (California, Colorado, Indiana, Massachusetts, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, Virginia)[1]
Key people	Sumit Dhawan (CEO) Marcel DePaolis (CTO) Rémi Thomas (CFO)
Products	Identity threat defense Email filtering Email privacy Email encryption Email archiving Anti-spam techniques Electronic discovery Data loss prevention software
Revenue	US$1.050 billion (2020)[2]
Operating income	–US$95.196 million (2020)[2]
Net income	–US$163.809 million (2020)[2]
Total assets	US$2.498 billion (2020)[2]
Total equity	US$441.744 million (2020)[2]
Owner	Thoma Bravo
Number of employees	3,658 (2020)[2]

Proofpoint office in Toronto

In 2021, Proofpoint was acquired by private equity firm Thoma Bravo for $12.3 billion.^[3]

History

The company was founded in July 2002 by Eric Hahn, formerly the CTO of Netscape Communications. It launched July 21, 2003, after raising a $7 million Series A funding round, an additional $9 million in Series B funding led by New York-based RRE Ventures was announced in October, 2003.^[4]

The company released the Proofpoint Protection Server (PPS) for medium and large businesses.

Proofpoint became a publicly traded company in April 2012. At the time of its initial public offering (IPO), the company's shares traded at $13 apiece; investors purchased more than 6.3 million shares through the IPO, raising more than $80 million.^[5]

On April 26, 2021, Proofpoint announced that it had agreed to be acquired by the private equity firm Thoma Bravo.^[6]

In May 2025, Proofpoint announced its acquisition of Hornetsecurity, forming what the company described as the world’s leading email-security group.^[7] The news carried a note of irony, as Hornetsecurity had previously acquired the French firm Vade - one year after Vade was found liable in a U.S. court in a patent-infringement case brought by that same Proofpoint.^[7] The deal also raised concerns about the loss of another European cybersecurity provider to U.S. ownership, prompting industry figures to warn that repeated acquisitions by American investors risk eroding Europe’s long-term digital sovereignty.^[7]

Proofpoint co-founder & chairman Eric Hahn (left) with then-CEO Gary Steele (right) at Proofpoint's 15th-anniversary celebration