OneTrust’s story is a true Atlanta story. Founded by Georgia Tech grads and AirWatch alumni, the company has grown to be a unicorn company with offices around the world and over half of the Fortune 500 as current customers…all while keeping its Atlanta roots.
Backed by global investors like Coatue, Softbank Vision Fund, Franklin Templeton, and Sands Capital, OneTrust could have scaled from just about anywhere in the world. But the company has decided strategically to continue to build in its hometown of Atlanta.
The most visible sign of that commitment is OneTrust’s new headquarters and office off of Atlanta’s Eastside Beltline Trail. The 73k square foot workspace will be home to about 450 Atlanta-based team members. It will serve as the company’s central hub for visitors.
The inside of the office itself is designed strategically with the modern workforce in mind. Walk around and you’ll see a mixture of collaboration areas and spots for deep work. But you’ll also find a cafe, an international snack wall, and a full suite of wellness facilities for employees who are coming into the office several days a week.
There are also some unique touches, like a full Speakeasy bar that sits behind a wall displaying OneTrust patents (over 300 in total).
OneTrust’s previous office, located in Sandy Springs, was larger in terms of overall square footage. But the move to Intown Atlanta sets up the company for further scale, Blake Brannon, OneTrust’s Chief Innovation Officer, told Hypepotamus during a recent tour of the 505 N Angier Ave office space.
Brannon said he sees Atlanta as a “unique positive differentiation” for OneTrust as it continues to grow both internationally and nationally. The city’s cost of living, access to engineering and AI talent, and airport accessibility are all key factors that helped OneTrust remain rooted in Atlanta.
Building For The AI Future
OneTrust isn’t the first major cybersecurity company to be founded in Atlanta. From ISS to SPI Dynamics to PGP Corporation, the city helped build the modern cybersecurity space. OneTrust, founded in 2016 by Georgia native Kabir Barday, launched to help companies comply with evolving international and domestic privacy laws with new data privacy management solutions.
Now, OneTrust’s mission has evolved to help “organizations use data and AI responsibly” while offering solutions for AI governance.
This is particularly important as more data is used in LLMs (large language models) and AI tools. As AI uses data as its fuel, there are new risks related to using that data in a safe and ethical way.
“A fundamental problem is privacy,” Brannon told Hypepotamus. OneTrust has released several AI-focused solutions to help with that fundamental problem, including a privacy breach response agent and OneTrust Copilot that gives privacy teams easy access to the exact regulatory, product, and program intelligence. It has also released new AI-driven workflows, designed to streamline assessments and internal documents.