Big data analytics company Tresata Inc. today said it has become the latest tech “unicorn” after securing $50 million in growth capital investment from GCP Capital Partners, bringing its valuation to $1 billion.

Tresata sells what it calls “customer intelligence management” software that provides insights into business imperatives such as customer identity, marketing, risk and fraud. The software uses cloud-based artificial intelligence and automation technologies in order to help enterprises solve “complex data problems” that include anti-money-laundering, population health issues and omnichannel marketing.

“Our software is uniquely able to automate data analysis to solve for complex business problems, allowing decision-makers to address industry’s and society’s biggest challenges,” Tresata co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Abhishek Mehta (pictured) said in a statement.

Tresata also helps companies stay in control of their data by ensuring it never leaves its systems, helping to alleviate executives’ concerns over data ownership.

Interestingly, the $50 million capital investment marks the first time Tresata has accepted money from outside investors, having self-funded its efforts since being founded in 2011. Explaining the lack of investment up to now, Mehta said he saw revenue as the cheapest form of capital for any company, and that Tresata had been successful with that strategy.

“We have had tremendous interest from investors ever since we started the company and never found the right partner,” Mehta said in an interview. “This time, with GCP, we found that partner. With GCP, we have someone on our side who believes strongly in our vision — that in data lies the power to enrich life. We are excited about this investment, as it is a validation of the confidence our clients have placed in us from the beginning.”

During an interview on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile live streaming studio, at BigData SV 2017 last year, Mehta talked about that vision, as well as the importance of big data for organizations. He described Tresata’s platform as a kind of “analytics operating system” that sits alongside hardware and data operating systems and “automates the extraction of intelligence from massive amounts of data sitting in the data layer.”

Mehta said that following the investment, Tresata’s plans won’t change but instead just accelerate.

“Our software automates solutions to incredibly complex business challenges,” he said. “We will use this investment to power our global growth, and further boost our lead in machine learning research and development.”

“We believe that Tresata is uniquely positioned to enable very large enterprises to manage and monetize their data assets, at a substantially lower cost and higher efficiency rate than existing competitors,” said Robert H. Niehaus, chairman and founder of GCP Capital Partners.

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