Sequoia Backs Simplisafe In A Play For The Home Security Market

Sequoia Capital has made a minority investment in the do-it-yourself home securitycompany Simplisafe in aplay onthe home security and automation market, TechCrunch has learned.

The investment from Sequoia cameon the heels of Googles $3.2 billion acquisition of Nest Labs, which showed just how lucrative the home market can be. That dealnetted ahealthy return for investors, including Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Generation Investment Management, Venrock, and Googles own Google Ventures.

The Nest acquisitionalsomarkedthe first pushby a large techcompany to open a gateway into home automation.Investors thinkit probably wont be the last.

Even before Nest showed the corporate appetite for home automation including thermostat controls for heating and cooling, home security, and other types of remote monitoring and management investors had begun backing a slew of startups tackling the problem.

The firm invested in Simplisafe after an intense bidding war through a process that was handled by the investment bank Raymond James, according to multiple sources with knowledge of the investment. Sequoia declined to comment for this article.

Simplisafesout-of-the-box home security system garners rave reviews, and is already installed in thousands of homes.

While Simplisafe has gotten a huge boost with its new Sequoia financing, its not the only entrant thats attracted big-name venture capital.Earlier this year Khosla Ventures invested $10 million in Canary, another high-concept, well-designed security system. And capital from investors keeps coming, according to data from CrunchBase.

Some investors may have placed early bets, but the market for do-it-yourself home security and automation is still wide open, and new opportunities to back privately held companies that havent yet raised any institutional investment abound.

For instance, the Chicago-based company Scouthas completed a successful Kickstarter campaign;FrontPoint Securityoffers a panoply of automated security technologies for the home; and LiveWatch Security also has new security and safety technologiesfor homeowners and apartment dwellers who would have more comfort if they were staying in a place more castlethan home.

Theres a bunch of investments in the space, says Lemnos Labs founder Jeremy Conrad. The fact is that everybody is looking at ADT and how they pull down a couple of billion dollars in revenue for a service that hasnt changed in twenty years. Its very similar to how Nest went after Honeywell in the thermostat space.

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Sequoia Backs Simplisafe In A Play For The Home Security Market