Sendmail, Inc. is an American email‑management company that provides software and services for email security, routing, archiving, and continuity. Headquartered in Emeryville, California, the company operates globally with offices throughout the Americas, Europe, and Asia. Since 2013, Sendmail has been a subsidiary of Proofpoint, Inc.
History
The company was founded in 1999 by Eric Allman in Emeryville, California. Allman previously created the open‑source mail transfer agent (MTA) called sendmail while a student and staff member at the University of California, Berkeley. Building on this technology, Sendmail, Inc. developed commercial products and services for enterprise email infrastructure.
In 2005, Sendmail released the Sentrion email infrastructure platform, which introduced full‑content message inspection and policy‑based delivery for both human and machine‑generated email. The company expanded its offerings in subsequent years, including hybrid‑cloud solutions in partnership with Mimecast (2012) and the Sentrion REAC (Rogue Email Application Control) appliance (2012) to address security concerns related to application‑generated email.
Acquisition
In October 2013, security‑as‑a‑service firm Proofpoint, Inc. acquired Sendmail, Inc., integrating its email management solutions into Proofpoint’s broader security portfolio.
Products and Services
Sendmail’s product line, marketed under the Sentrion brand, encompasses a range of appliances and cloud‑based services for:
- Email security and policy enforcement
- Content filtering and threat detection
- Email archiving and compliance
- Hybrid‑cloud deployment models for messaging infrastructure
These solutions are designed to protect enterprise email environments, reduce infrastructure complexity, and ensure reliable message delivery across on‑premises, cloud, and mobile platforms.