
Valar leads $1.2m round for Australian IT start-up
Valar Ventures, the venture capital firm run by PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, has made its first investment in Australia, leading a $1.2 million round for IT start-up ScriptRock.
Sydney-based ScriptRock automates the testing that is usually performed manually by technology staff when making changes to desktops and servers. It provides automated test suites that run hundreds of tests per minute against clients' applications, systems and infrastructure.
"ScriptRock has an excellent founding team who are addressing a global problem, and we look forward to seeing them continue to develop their vision in the years ahead," said James Fitzgerald, a partner at Valar Ventures.
The fresh capital will pay for the firm's three co-founders - Michael Baukes, Alan Sharp-Paul and Leo Venegas - to relocate to the US, and will allow them to extend their Australian operations.
ScriptRock went fundraising in the US to attract investors to the round, which closed in mid-June. Paul Bassat, co-founder of the world's largest job search website Seek, and Scott Petry, founder of email and web security service Postini, also contributed capital.
Valar, which has been in operation since 2010, supplies growth capital funding to early-stage technology businesses to help develop their technology and expand them abroad. Up until now, all portfolio companies have been based in New Zealand.
In March, the firm raised NZ$40 million ($32 million) for a vehicle launched in partnership with the New Zealand Venture Investment Fund.
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