‘Toxic’: Darktrace’s future clouded by concerns over culture and fraud case

theguardian.com:

It is an award-winning pioneer in the fast-growing cybersecurity industry, boasting veterans of the spy community and the British political establishment on its payroll.

It is also the subject of admiring glances from a deep-pocketed US private equity house pondering a takeover that could lead to payouts worth £200m for its management team.

But there are clouds hanging over Darktrace, in the shape ofanalysts’ criticism of its business model and concerns about its workplace culture, not to mention an escalating legal battle over a multi-billion pound fraud.

Within weeks, a high court judge will decide whether Darktrace’s founder, the British billionaire entrepreneur Mike Lynch, can prolong his fight against extradition to the US.

There, the man sometimes dubbed Britain’s answer to Microsoft founder Bill Gates would face charges of fraud relating to the $11bn (£8.5bn) sale of Autonomy, the tech business he founded, to Hewlett-Packard.

It has not gone well for the 57-year-old tech genius so far.

Lynch’s erstwhile lieutenant, Autonomy’s finance director Sushovan Hussain, has already been jailed for five years over charges relating to the same events.

In January, the high court ruled, in a civil fraud case brought by HP, that Lynch duped HP into buying his company.

Almost simultaneously, the then home secretary Priti Patel determined that Lynch could be extradited. The charges, which he denies, carry a maximum custodial sentence of 25 years.

Lynch’s only hope of avoiding extradition is to be granted the right to appeal, with a decision expected this month. Failure would set the extradition wheels in motion.

The uncertainty casts a shadow not just over Lynch but over Darktrace, despite its insistence that it is unaffected by Lynch’s