This Chainguard company profile covers the company's valuation, revenue, funding rounds, investors and history. Chainguard works in cybersecurity, with a focus on software supply chain security. It was founded in 2021 and is headquartered in Kirkland, Washington, United States. Its latest valuation on record is US$3.5 billion (April 2025). Every figure links to a public source, and anything the company hasn't disclosed is marked as such.
Revenue
| Metric | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| ARR target | About US$40 million ARR in fiscal 2025, with a target of more than US$100 million by the end of fiscal 2026 (reported) | April 2025 | Verdict |
Funding history
| Date | Round | Amount | Valuation | Investors | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Oct 2025 | Growth investment | US$280M | Not disclosed | General Catalyst Customer Value Fund | SecurityWeek |
| Oct 2025 | Growth financing | US$280M | US$3.5B (unchanged, reported) | General Catalyst Customer Value Fund | Daily Security Review |
| Apr 2025 | Series D | About US$356M | US$3.5B | Kleiner Perkins and IVP (co-leads) | Crunchbase News |
| Jul 2024 | Series C | US$140M | About US$1.12B | Redpoint, Lightspeed and IVP | Crunchbase News |
Chainguard timeline
Key dates from the sources on this page, oldest first. Metric snapshots are listed after the funding events.
- 2021 — Chainguard is founded in Kirkland by Dan Lorenc (CEO), Kim Lewandowski and other former Google engineers.
- Jul 2024 — Series C: US$140M, valuing the company at About US$1.12B. Investors: Redpoint, Lightspeed and IVP.
- Apr 2025 — Series D: About US$356M, valuing the company at US$3.5B. Investors: Kleiner Perkins and IVP (co-leads).
- Oct 2025 — Growth financing: US$280M, valuing the company at US$3.5B (unchanged, reported). Investors: General Catalyst Customer Value Fund.
- Oct 2025 — Growth investment: US$280M. Investors: General Catalyst Customer Value Fund.
- April 2025 — ARR target: About US$40 million ARR in fiscal 2025, with a target of more than US$100 million by the end of fiscal 2026 (reported).
Investors
Overview
Chainguard sells secure, minimal building blocks for software. Its main product is a catalogue of container images, the packaged environments in which most modern applications run, that are rebuilt from source continuously, stripped of unnecessary components and kept free of known vulnerabilities. Companies that switch to Chainguard images can eliminate most of the security alerts generated by standard images and reduce their exposure to software supply chain attacks. Chainguard has expanded into secure open-source libraries for languages such as Java and Python, virtual machine images and tools for AI workloads.
Dan Lorenc, the CEO, and Kim Lewandowski founded Chainguard in 2021 with a group of former Google engineers who had worked on open-source security. They were among the creators of Sigstore, a widely used open-source project for signing and verifying software, and of SLSA, a framework for supply chain security. Chainguard is based in Kirkland, Washington, near Seattle, and operates largely remotely.
The problem: vulnerable software ingredients
Most applications are assembled from open-source components: operating system packages, language libraries, runtimes and tools. Standard container images often include hundreds of packages that an application doesn't need, many with known vulnerabilities (CVEs). Security scanners flag these, creating long lists of issues for engineering teams to triage, and compliance frameworks such as FedRAMP require them to be fixed within strict deadlines. Attackers increasingly target the software supply chain, compromising popular packages or build systems to reach thousands of downstream users. Chainguard's approach is to fix the problem at the source by providing clean, minimal, continuously updated ingredients.
Products
- Chainguard Containers: more than a thousand hardened container images for popular languages, databases and tools, typically with zero known CVEs.
- Chainguard Libraries: open-source libraries for Java, Python and JavaScript rebuilt from source in a secure environment to protect against malicious packages.
- Chainguard VMs: minimal virtual machine images.
- Wolfi: an open-source Linux distribution designed for containers, which underpins its images.
- AI images: secure images for machine learning frameworks and GPU workloads.
Funding
Chainguard raised a US$140 million Series C in July 2024 at about US$1.12 billion, becoming a unicorn. In April 2025 it raised a Series D of about US$356 million at US$3.5 billion, co-led by new investor Kleiner Perkins and existing investor IVP, more than tripling its valuation in nine months. In October 2025 it announced a US$280 million growth financing from General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund, a structure that provides capital tied to customer growth; reports said the valuation stayed at US$3.5 billion and total capital raised approached US$900 million. Other investors include Redpoint, Lightspeed, Sequoia Capital, Spark Capital and Mantis VC.
Growth
Reports at the time of the Series D said Chainguard reached about US$40 million in annual recurring revenue in fiscal 2025 and aimed to exceed US$100 million by the end of fiscal 2026. Those are reported figures and targets, so we show revenue as not disclosed in the fact tiles. Customers include large technology companies, financial institutions and government contractors that need to meet strict vulnerability requirements.
Competition
Chainguard competes with Docker's hardened images, Red Hat's Universal Base Images, Google's distroless images, vendors such as Minimus and Echo, and security companies like Snyk that scan and help fix vulnerabilities rather than replacing components. Many companies also build their own minimal images. Chainguard's advantages are its founders' credibility in open-source security, the breadth of its catalogue and its speed in rebuilding images when new vulnerabilities appear.
Chainguard at a glance
Chainguard is a Kirkland, Washington, software supply chain security company founded in 2021 by Dan Lorenc, Kim Lewandowski and other former Google engineers. It provides hardened, minimal container images and secure open-source libraries. It raised a US$140 million Series C at about US$1.12 billion in July 2024, a Series D of about US$356 million at US$3.5 billion in April 2025, and US$280 million in growth financing in October 2025.
Timeline
- 2021: founded by former Google open-source security engineers.
- 2022: launches Wolfi and its first hardened images.
- July 2024: raises a US$140 million Series C at about US$1.12 billion.
- April 2025: raises a Series D of about US$356 million at US$3.5 billion.
- October 2025: secures US$280 million growth financing from General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund.
Why supply chain security became urgent
High-profile incidents changed how companies think about software dependencies. The SolarWinds attack in 2020 showed how compromising a vendor's build process could reach thousands of organisations, including government agencies. The Log4Shell vulnerability in 2021 exposed how widely a single open-source library could be embedded. In 2024 a backdoor was discovered in XZ Utils, a compression library included in many Linux systems, planted by an attacker who had spent years gaining maintainers' trust. Governments responded with requirements such as software bills of materials (SBOMs) and secure development standards, pushing companies to take control of what goes into their software.
Questions for security and platform teams
- How many vulnerabilities do your current base images carry, and how much time does triage take?
- Which compliance frameworks require vulnerability remediation within deadlines?
- How easily can your applications move to minimal images?
- How quickly does the vendor patch new vulnerabilities?
Latest developments (October 2026)
After its April 2025 Series D of US$356 million at US$3.5 billion, Chainguard added a US$280 million growth investment in October 2025 from General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund, without a disclosed new valuation, according to SecurityWeek. Reports put total funding near US$900 million. The company said annual recurring revenue grew about sevenfold in fiscal 2025 to US$40 million and projected US$100 million by the end of fiscal 2026. See our developer tools guide.
What to watch
Watch whether Chainguard reaches its ARR targets, growth of its libraries product, AI workload adoption, new funding and competition from Docker and other image providers.
Takeaways
Security teams can cut vulnerability noise by changing the ingredients, not just scanning them. Founders can see how open-source credibility becomes commercial advantage. Investors should watch whether rapid valuation growth is matched by revenue growth.
Sources
Every figure on this page comes from the public sources below. Where sources disagreed, we used the company's own announcement or a primary news report. Private-company data changes; check the date beside each figure.
Frequently asked questions
What does Chainguard do?
Chainguard is a cybersecurity / software supply chain security company headquartered in Kirkland, Washington, United States. It was founded in 2021.
What is Chainguard's valuation?
Chainguard was valued at US$3.5 billion as of April 2025, according to Crunchbase News. Private company valuations are set at funding rounds or share sales and can change significantly between them.
How much revenue does Chainguard make?
Chainguard is a private company and has not publicly disclosed its revenue. Figures on third-party sites are usually modelled estimates rather than numbers reported by the company.
What was Chainguard's latest funding round?
The most recent financing we have verified is a growth investment in Oct 2025: US$280M. Source: SecurityWeek.
Who are Chainguard's investors?
Investors named in public announcements include Kleiner Perkins, IVP, General Catalyst, Redpoint Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital and Spark Capital.
Who founded Chainguard?
Chainguard was founded in 2021 by Dan Lorenc (CEO), Kim Lewandowski and other former Google engineers.
Is Chainguard a public company?
No. Chainguard is a private company (private, venture backed), so its shares are not traded on a stock exchange and it isn't required to publish its financial results.
Where is Chainguard headquartered?
Chainguard is headquartered in Kirkland, Washington, United States.