By Business & Finance 
David Walsh, Co-founder/CEO and Niall Kelly, Co-founder/CTO, Netwatch with An Taoiseach Leo Varadkar TD
Irish security monitoring company Netwatch announced the establishment of Netwatch Group following investment from Riverside, a global private equity firm.
Netwatch will join forces with National Monitoring Center (NMC), CalAtlantic, Onwatch Multifire to become Netwatch Group, a new global leader in proactive security monitoring services. The company is headquartered in Carlow, Ireland.
With security being such a sensitive issue now, particularly in the online sphere, there is an increasing demand for visual monitoring.
David Walsh, CEO, Netwatch Group, said: “Today we are creating a global powerhouse in proactive monitoring services. There is increased demand for visual monitoring from enterprise customers, driven by the continuing evolution of technology and advances such as AI, deep learning, 5G and IoT (Internet of Things). We have the proprietary technology, developed by our R&D team in Carlow to meet this demand. We have ambitious growth plans which we will achieve through organic growth and further acquisitions.”
The investor, Riverside, has completed more than 85 international technology investments in its history. The deal is led by UK and Ireland Partner Dr Martin Scott, with Principal Laura Dillon sitting on the board of the new group.
David Walsh said of the partnership: “We are delighted that in Riverside we have secured a partner who shares our vision and aspirations to become a global leader in our sector and we look forward to executing our ambitious growth strategy with them.”
Dr Martin Scott said: “Netwatch revolutionised the Irish security market with its business model and innovative remote visual monitoring technologies and has an ambition to lead the sector globally. It now monitors client sites on four continents and has grown rapidly since its foundation. We are delighted to back the management team as they realise their ambitions. This is our first investment in Ireland and we look forward to supporting more Irish companies that seek to become global players in their sectors.”
The group has also announced the appointment of Samir Samhouri as Chairman. Samir developed Xtralis, a global leader in safety and security technologies
Advisors to Netwatch were William Fry, EY, Grant Thornton and Bank of Ireland Corporate Banking.
