💰 Security, Funded #152 - We Just Might Be So Back

Hey there,

I hope you had a great weekend!

Last week, the latest print of the US Consumer Price Index (CPI) showed a pretty good signal that economic conditions are starting to stabilize (otherwise, the news last week was a 🗑️ 🔥 ).

With only a modest rise in the core CPI metrics, public market investors will remain confident that an interest rate cut is still coming in 2024. This means people will continue to invest, which creates more confidence, and stocks go up and to the right. This confidence will support continued investments into private markets and startups, and the cybersecurity industry will continue its upward trajectory.

And for yet another positive signal for the cybersecurity industry, Google is reportedly in talks to buy Wiz for $23 billion 🤯 (which would be the second largest cyber M&A in history behind Cisco acquiring Splunk for $28 billion). I don’t normally like to talk about rumors here, preferring to wait until the facts hit the ground, but this one is too big to ignore. Which is par for the course for Wiz.

If this deal goes through without anti-trust lawsuits, we will, ladies and gentlemen, be unequivocally and unabashedly so back. 😤 👊 

Onward to this week's issue.

😎 Vibe Check

Last issue’s vibe check:
What influences your cybersecurity vendor selection the most?
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💰 Cost Only (6)
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🛜 Online Reviews (1)
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 📒 Analyst Reports (1)
🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️ 👩🏽‍🔬 Personal Research (17)
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 👯‍♀️ Peer Recommendations (19)
44 Votes

It should come as no surprise to anyone who is a cybersecurity practitioner that talking to your cyber homies and conducting personal research is how most people make cyber buying decisions. While the value of analyst reports is hotly debated, it doesn’t seem like most people are adding these reports or online review sites into their cyber calculus.

Some of the top comments from last week, and a newsletter first of someone quoting poetry 🧐:

“Peer recommendations are the clear answer. They come from someone I know, trust at some level, and can harangue mercilessly if they're wrong (and maybe if they're right ;-). Half a league, half a league, Half a league onward, All in the valley of Death, Rode the six hundred.”

“Not the reviews the vendor provided, but actual conversations with people I know that use the vendor.”

💰 Market Summary

📸 YoY Snapshot

A predictably slow uptick in the funding from last week as we ease out of the 4th of July holiday week for many. We’ll see a ramp-up these next 2 weeks.

Have you even been reading this newsletter? M&A is on fire this year, even with lower transaction volume year to date. If even half the rumors come true, this year is going to blow other years out of the water.

🤙 Earnings Reports

🧩 Funding By Product Category

Well, this is a first. A company came out of stealth with a seed round with no discernible signs of a product, so I just put “TBD.”

• $28.0M for TBD across 1 deal (¯\_(ツ)_/¯)

• $21.0M for Security Operations across 1 deal

• $16.0M for Security Incident Management across 1 deal

• $6.4M for Professional Services across 1 deal

• $5.0M for Deception Technology across 1 deal

• $2.7M for Firmware Security across 1 deal

• $2.0M for Network Security across 1 deal

🏢 Funding By Company

• Sola Security, an Israel-based security company with a product yet to be determined, raised a $28.0M Seed from S Capital. (more) (Will update this when I learn more)

• Command Zero, a United States-based security operations and investigation platform, raised a $21.0M Seed from Andreessen Horowitz. (more)

• Cytactic, an Israel-based platform for managing the process of cyber incident response and crisis management, raised a $16.0M Seed from Evolution Equity Partners. (more)

• PureCyber, a United Kingdom-based professional services firm focused on cyber governance and penetration testing, raised a $6.4M Private Equity Round from the Business Growth Fund. (more)

• Tracebit, a United Kingdom-based deception technology platform, raised a $5.0M Seed from Accel and Tapestry VC. (more)

• Zymbit, a United States-based secure firmware and components manufacturer for building secure IoT/OT deployments, raised a $2.7M Venture Round. (more)

• FoxIO, a United States-based maker of network security monitoring software, raised a $2.0M Seed. (more)

🌎 Funding By Country

• $44.0M for Israel across 2 deals

• $25.7M for the United States across 3 deals

• $11.4M for the United Kingdom across 2 deals

🤝 Mergers & Acquisitions

• Polarity, a United States-based security event intelligence enrichment platform, was acquired by ThreatConnect for an undisclosed amount. (more)

• Stratejm, a Canada-based managed security services provider (MSSP), was acquired by Bell Canada for an undisclosed amount. (more)

• Sublime Computer Services, a United States-based managed security services provider (MSSP), was acquired by The 20 MSP for an undisclosed amount. (more)

• True North Solutions, a Canada-based professional services firm focused on operational technology engineering and security, was acquired by Accenture for an undisclosed amount. (more)

📚 Great Reads

• The AI Financial Results Paradox - AI usage in businesses has hit an inflection point where the return on massive amounts of investment has not proven itself yet, but the cost of not using it may be even more expensive.

• *It’s time for a new SaaS shared responsibility model - With the rise of threat campaigns targeting SaaS instances, we need a shared responsibility model that includes employees as well as IT security teams.

• RAID (Real World AI Definitions) - Daniel Miessler created a set of real-world AI definitions designed to be usable in discussion.

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🧪 Labs

Wireshark do do do do do do