MailFrontier

MailFrontier, founded in December 2001 by Pavni Diwanji and Brian Wilson, was a cybersecurity company specializing in email security and compliance solutions for the mid-enterprise market. The initial idea was to create a consumer spam blocker, but the focus shifted to the corporate market after early venture capital feedback. The company was originally incorporated as "MailFront" and later changed its name to MailFrontier in August 2002. Diwanji, who served as CEO for the first two and a quarter years, brought a wealth of experience to the venture. Her background includes a Bachelor's in Computer Science from LD College of Engineering, a Master's from Stanford University, and a significant role at Sun Microsystems as a key developer of Java, where she is known for inventing servlets. This technical expertise was foundational to MailFrontier's product development.

The company provided both appliance- and software-based solutions designed to protect organizations from inbound and outbound email threats, including spam, viruses, and phishing attacks. Its product suite, the MailFrontier Gateway Appliance Series, also offered policy enforcement and control to help businesses meet regulatory compliance and corporate governance requirements. Key features included the examination of both inbound and outbound mail, protection against worms and zombies, and the ability for administrators to define specific policy violations related to legislative compliance, proprietary information, or inappropriate content. One of its early consumer-facing products, known as Matador, was launched in 2002. The company generated revenue through the sale of its security appliances and software licenses, with pricing based on the number of accounts protected and throughput. By early 2005, MailFrontier had signed its 1,000th enterprise customer and crossed the $10 million lifetime revenue mark.

After raising a total of $21.5 million in funding over four rounds from investors including New Enterprise Associates, DFJ, and Menlo Ventures, MailFrontier was acquired by SonicWall in February 2006 for approximately $31 million in an all-cash transaction. At the time of the acquisition, MailFrontier had over 1,700 customers, including major clients like OfficeMax and Wyndham International. The acquisition was part of SonicWall's strategy to enhance its secure content management (SCM) and unified threat management (UTM) offerings by integrating MailFrontier's technology and intellectual property portfolio. Diwanji left her daily role at the company in March 2005 to serve as Chairman of the Board before moving on to significant roles at Google and Meta. Keywords: email security, anti-spam, anti-phishing, compliance solutions, network security, corporate governance, inbound threat protection, outbound threat protection, secure content management, email filtering, virus protection, policy enforcement, appliance-based security, software security, Pavni Diwanji, Brian Wilson, SonicWall acquisition, Matador, enterprise email security, regulatory compliance