What Anchore does

Anchore, Inc. is a private software company founded in 2016 and headquartered in Santa Barbara, California (with a UK regional office in London), that builds an SBOM-powered software supply chain security platform for enterprises and government agencies operating containerized workloads. The core product, Anchore Enterprise, is composed of three integrated modules: Anchore SBOM (ingestion, normalization, and lifecycle management of Software Bills of Materials in SPDX, CycloneDX, and Syft formats), Anchore Secure (continuous vulnerability, malware, and secret scanning with false-positive/negative mitigations), and Anchore Enforce (policy-as-code compliance automation with pre-built policy packs for FedRAMP, NIST 800-53/190/171/218, DISA STIG, CMMC Level 2, DORA, and CIS Docker benchmarks). The platform is anchored on the company's open source projects — Syft (SBOM generation), Grype (vulnerability scanning), and Grant (license checking) — and includes a 'Bring Your Own SBOM' capability launched in May 2025 plus runtime inventory across EKS, ECS, AKE, GKE, and OpenShift clusters.

Anchore is named as a required scanning tool in the DoD Container Hardening Guide and is IL-6 ready for air-gapped classified environments, with availability through the DoD ESI Master License Agreement. Named customers include Cisco, eBay, NVIDIA, GitHub, GitLab, Infoblox, DreamFactory, the U.S. Department of Defense, and the U.S. Air Force (Platform One). The company earns revenue primarily through quote-based annual Anchore Enterprise subscriptions (Anchore SBOM is included in all subscriptions), supplemented by professional services under Essential and Complete Success Plans.

Commercially, Anchore operates a hybrid go-to-market model: direct enterprise field sales with Request a Demo and Free Trial CTAs for Fortune 500 and federal customers, combined with product-led growth through its open source Syft and Grype CLIs that feed enterprise upgrade pipelines, plus channel partners, system integrators, and resellers for federal and government deployments. The company has raised approximately $41M across multiple rounds (most recent $20M Series 2 from SignalFire in January 2020 and a $10M Espresso Capital facility in October 2022) and was recognized in 2026 as one of the top 10 container security firms by Inventiva. Notable recent moves include a strategic partnership with Chainguard announced in September 2025 and ongoing platform enhancements aligned with FedRAMP, EU CRA, and DORA regulatory timelines.

Name

Anchore

Legal name

Anchore, Inc.

Website

https://anchore.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2016

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

Anchore is a private software supply chain security company that sells an SBOM-powered container security platform (Anchore Enterprise) — combining SBOM management, vulnerability scanning, and policy-driven compliance automation — to Fortune 500 enterprises and U.S. federal/defense agencies including the DoD and Air Force.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Software Supply Chain Security

NAICS

Computing Infrastructure Providers, Data Processing, Web Hosting, and Related Services (518)

SIC

Services-Computer Programming Services (7371)

akta.pro primary industry

Intrusion Detection & Prevention Systems (IDS/IPS) (HDAFAFAD)

akta.pro secondary industry

Intrusion Prevention/Detection Systems (IPS/IDS) (HDADABAH)

Keywords

• Software supply chain security
• Container security
• SBOM management
• Vulnerability scanning
• Compliance automation

Headquarters

HQ city

Santa Barbara

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices2 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Anchore Enterprise Subscription: Enterprise software subscription model for the full platform including SBOM management, vulnerability scanning, and compliance enforcement. Anchore SBOM is included in all Anchore Enterprise subscriptions.
2. Professional Services: Technical Account Manager (TAM) and Technical Account Engineer services, Essential Success Plan and Complete Success Plan for onboarding and support.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion3 records

Distribution channels4 records

Marketing channels7 records

Core offering

Anchore sells Anchore Enterprise, an SBOM-powered software supply chain security platform that ingests and analyzes Software Bills of Materials and continuously scans container images for vulnerabilities, malware, and secrets. The platform enforces policies for regulatory frameworks (FedRAMP, NIST, DISA STIG, CIS, CMMC, DORA) from build to runtime, anchored by Syft and Grype open source tools.

Product overview

Anchore offers Anchore Enterprise, the first SBOM-powered software supply chain management platform. The platform consists of three integrated modules: Anchore SBOM (for SBOM generation, ingestion, and management), Anchore Secure (for vulnerability scanning, malware detection, and secret scanning), and Anchore Enforce (for compliance automation and policy enforcement). The platform also includes Anchore Federal for government deployments. Anchore maintains a portfolio of open source tools including Syft (SBOM generation), Grype (vulnerability scanning), and Grant (license checking), which form the foundation for the enterprise platform.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Syft: Open source CLI tool for generating Software Bill of Materials (SBOM) from container images and filesystems.
• Grype
• Grant
• Anchore Enterprise
• Anchore SBOM
• Anchore Secure
• Anchore Enforce
• Anchore Federal

Products and services

• Anchore Enterprise SBOM-powered software supply chain management platform for continuous security and compliance; centralizes internal and external SBOMs to track software supply chain issues, ensures security of software products, and embeds security and compliance checks across the development lifecycle. Sold to enterprise customers (Fortune 500 and government).
• Anchore SBOM Enterprise SBOM analysis and compliance module that ingests SBOMs in SPDX, CycloneDX, and Syft native formats, normalizes and deduplicates them, organizes them in Application and Version contexts, and applies searchable annotations with key/value pairs. Included with Anchore Enterprise subscriptions.
• Anchore Secure Container security scanning module that automates scanning of container images, source code, and filesystems for vulnerabilities, malware, and secrets; provides continuous vulnerability monitoring, ecosystem coverage, false positive/negative mitigations, and runtime context across Kubernetes clusters.
• Anchore Enforce Compliance automation module that enforces policies at every stage of the SDLC; provides FedRAMP, NIST, DISA, and DoD policy packs, flexible reporting, runtime context for production compliance verification, license management, and Dockerfile controls.
• Anchore Federal Public sector deployment of Anchore Enterprise designed for air-gapped environments meeting DoD IL-6 and FIPS requirements; supports NIST compliance tools and federal policy packs for DoD, Air Force Platform One, DISA, and other federal agencies.
• Syft Open source CLI tool for generating Software Bills of Materials from container images and filesystems; produces high-fidelity SBOMs with dependencies, file metadata, licenses, and content in JSON, SPDX, and CycloneDX output formats. Forms the SBOM engine inside Anchore Enterprise.
• Grype Open source CLI vulnerability scanner for container images, SBOMs, and filesystems; produces lists of known vulnerabilities with OS and language-specific package matching across multiple sources. Forms the vulnerability scanning engine inside Anchore Enterprise.
• Grant Open source CLI tool and Go library for checking software licenses in container images, SBOMs, and filesystems; supports license policy enforcement as part of Anchore's open source ecosystem.

Quantifiable outcome

• Vulnerability response time reduced from weeks to minutes with SBOM-based approach
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers12 records

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

Yes

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration20 records

AI capability2 records

Feature9 records

Partnerships

Five partnerships are on record, tiered core and flagship.

• ChainguardcoreStrategic or Co-development Partner · 23 September 2025Anchore and Chainguard partnered to deliver next-generation supply chain security solutions, strengthening software delivery integrity and protection against threats. The partnership aims to enhance supply chain security through combined solutions.
• GitHubcoreTechnology or IntegrationGitHub Actions integration with Anchore Container Scan enables developers to build security directly into their workflows. Anchore is featured in GitHub Actions marketplace.
• GitLabcoreTechnology or IntegrationGitLab integration with Anchore scanning technology helps joint customers increase speed to mission delivery and reduce risks associated with software development.
• U.S. Department of DefenseflagshipOthersAnchore is named as a required scanning tool in the DoD Container Hardening Guide and Container Image Creation and Deployment Guide. Key component for DoD Iron Bank container security. Available via DoD ESI Master License Agreement.
• U.S. Air Force (Platform One)flagshipStrategic or Co-development PartnerCollaboration on container hardening process for Platform One DevSecOps initiative. Anchore's strong understanding of DoD goals translated into strong support for adoption of modern DevSecOps practices.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights6 records

Direct peers

• Sonatype: SBOM and software supply chain security vendor (Nexus platform) — directly comparable to Anchore's SBOM-centric value proposition and enterprise compliance focus.
• Aqua Security: Direct competitor in container and cloud-native application security, offering vulnerability scanning, runtime protection, and compliance for Kubernetes environments — the closest functional competitor to Anchore Enterprise.
• Snyk: Developer security platform with strong container image scanning and SBOM capabilities alongside SCA, IaC, and code security; overlaps Anchore in container vuln scanning and enterprise DevSecOps workflows.
• Cycode: Software supply chain security platform covering SDLC, secrets, SCA, and container security with a focus on pipeline integrity — comparable in positioning to Anchore's supply-chain narrative.
• Chainguard: Supply chain security company focused on hardened, minimal container base images and recently partnered with Anchore — overlapping in software supply chain security messaging and buyer base.
• Mend (formerly WhiteSource): SCA and SBOM management vendor serving enterprise development teams — comparable to Anchore SBOM and Anchore Secure for open source dependency and container vulnerability management.

Broad incumbents

• JFrog: Binary repository and DevSecOps platform with security scanning (Xray) and SBOM capabilities — adjacent competitor for enterprise buyers consolidating software supply chain tooling.
• Wiz: Cloud security platform with growing container and workload protection capabilities; an enterprise incumbent that increasingly overlaps Anchore's runtime/Kubernetes visibility narrative.
• Prisma Cloud (Palo Alto Networks): Broad CNAPP from Palo Alto Networks (incorporating ex-Twistlock) covering container security alongside CSPM, CIEM, and CWPP — competes head-on with Anchore at enterprise tier but as part of a much larger platform.
• GitHub Advanced Security: GitHub's bundled code, dependency, and container scanning offering; competes with Anchore for developer-led adoption and is already integrated via Anchore's GitHub Actions presence.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/anchore
• GitHubgithub.com/anchore
• YouTubeyoutube.com/anchore
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/anchore
• Facebookfacebook.com/anchore

Compliance11 records

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles8 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds6 records

Investors3 records

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Anchore