Startup ThreatStream Inc. bagged $22 million in fresh funding on Wednesday to develop its Big Data-driven approach to information security.

The Redwood-based team launched last year and hit the industry radar this January after appointing Hugh Njemanze as CEO. The executive is one of the most prominent figures in the security industry, having previously co-founded ArcSight Inc., the pioneering network analytics powerhouse that was bought by Hewlett-Packard Co. in 2010 for $1.5 billion.

ThreatStream is the brainchild of a former cybercrime adviser to the FBI and Secret Service. Its platform – called OPTIC – funnels real-time data from every corner of the cybersecurity landscape through an array of homegrown algorithms to identify threats. Malware is automatically classified based on its characteristics, traced back to the source and correlated with other analogies in the stream to make out attack patterns.

ThreatStream isn’t the first company to tackle threat intelligence. EMC’s RSA security division already offerers a similar service and several industries – particularly financial services and retail – actively share information on new malware among themselves. But the company claims that it performs the task better, integrating with existing security infrastructure to make it possible for organizations to quickly adjust their defenses without having to bring in costly appliances. ThreatStream’s platform also has built-in collaboration features that help practitioners coordinate responses with their peers.

Besides an all-star CEO, that value proposition has also earned ThreatStream more than 1,000 users across the Fortune 1000 and the public sector, a customer base that the new $22 million in funding from Snapchat Inc. backer Catalyst Partners, Google Ventures and Paladin Capital Group is meant to expand. The infusion bumps the company’s total outside capital past the $26 million mark and will be used to hire more workers.