KU Leuven spinoff Belfort unveils encrypted-compute accelerator and raises $6M

Encryption startup Belfort, a KU Leuven spinoff, has closed a $6 million seed round to make encrypted data processing practical in real time. The round was led by deeptech investor Vsquared Ventures, with participation from Anagram, Protocol VC, Inovia Capital, Syndicate One, Prototype, Credibly Neutral, and angels including Jeff Dean (Google) and Naval Ravikant. The funds will support team expansion, technology advancement, early enterprise pilots, and development of a custom chip.

Protecting sensitive data during processing is increasingly essential, not just at rest or in transit. Belfort addresses this with a hardware accelerator purpose-built for encrypted compute, enabling computation directly on encrypted data without decryption and overcoming long-standing speed and cost barriers.

The technology is available via AWS Marketplace and can be integrated with minimal effort across healthcare, finance, and government. Practical applications include fraud detection, genomic analysis, and secure government operations.

Belfort originated from KU Leuven’s COSIC lab, led by Prof. Ingrid Verbauwhede, a specialist in cryptographic hardware and a two-time ERC grant recipient. The company was co-founded by Michiel Van Beirendonck and Furkan Turan, with Laurens De Poorter (formerly Kraken Ventures and Google) adding operational leadership experience. Its core research matured over several years through major grants, including from the European Research Council, and a competitive US government contract with DARPA.

Belfort’s view is that in an AI-first world, encrypted compute is foundational to trust. By combining advances in hardware and algorithms, the company aims to make processing sensitive data without decryption practical at scale and to establish the next layer of secure computing.

Michiel Van Beirendonck, Co-founder and CEO, said:

AI is transforming everything, but the infrastructure to keep sensitive data and models secure hasn’t caught up. Encrypted compute is the answer, but without hardware acceleration, it doesn’t scale. The company that cracks that challenge could become the next billion-dollar business.

Belfort will use the new funding to double its team and accelerate product, technology, and business development across its San Francisco and Leuven offices.