💰 Security, Funded #207 - New High Score!

Hey -

Hope you had a great weekend! I think I’m mostly recovered from Black Hat and all the jet lag now. 🥴

Well, friends, it’s official. Cybersecurity funding for 2025 has already officially surpassed ALL of the funding raised in 2024. That’s right, the industry has raised over $14 billion as of August 17, 2025, looking at both the private and public markets! 🤯 

Much of the momentum has obviously been boosted by AI investments into the three buckets I’m seeing:

• AI for Security

• Security for AI

• Security from AI

_{If you’re seeing other groupings, let me know!}

Momentum doesn’t always necessarily translate into volume from a dollar's perspective, however, but AI is driving other parts of the ecosystem. AI is driving an increase in cloud and SaaS spending and adoption, which, in turn, is generating increased demand for cyber products and services across both AI and non-AI variations.

What a timeline to be alive in. Let’s get this bread, fam. 🥖 

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😎 Vibe Check

Click the options below to vote on whether you are a practitioner, founder, or investor. Feel free to leave a comment, and I'll feature the best takes in next week’s write-up!

Last issue’s vibe check:
How does your team really prepare for budget season?
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Last year's plan + 10%
🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️ Ask ChatGPT / Claude
🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ Throw darts at vendor list
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ Oprah Method - Everyone gets new tools

The fact that "It depends 2.0" won with 46% of votes is peak cybersecurity, honesty. We started in this world of cyber with "it depends" to acknowledging that we're running "it depends" as the actual operating model. The spreadsheet warriors coming in second (24%) confirm what we all know > Excel is the ultimate security platform. 🙄 (but for real 👀 ).

Some of the top comments from last week’s vibe check:

💬 “Most security teams cannot comprehend the idea of reducing costs or reusing existing budget to improve. It's always more more more... ”

💬 “😭” (lol)

✍🏽 _{Have a question you want answered? Ask Return on Security.}

💰 Market Summary

📸 YoY Snapshot

Funding activity over the past 12 weeks totaled $6.9B across 153 deals (mean: $52.0M, median: $9.2M), representing a 132% increase compared to the same period last year when $3.0B was invested across 133 deals.

M&A activity remained strong, with 92 acquisitions completed over the trailing 12 weeks (averaging 7.7 per week). This represents a 77% increase from the 52 acquisitions during the same period in the previous year.

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☎️ Earnings Reports

🧩 Funding By Product Category

• $67.0M for Passwordless Authentication across 2 deals

• $2.0M for Operational Technology (OT) Security across 1 deal

🏢 Funding By Company

Product Companies:

• 1Kosmos, a United States-based passwordless authentication and multi-factor authentication (MFA) platform, raised a $57.0M Series B from Forgepoint Capital and Oquirrh Ventures and a $10.0M Debt Financing from Bridge Bank. (more)

• BLUESKYTEC, a United Kingdom-based hardware and software security platform for operational technology and critical infrastructure, raised a $2.0M Venture Round from Maven Capital Partners. (more)

Service Companies:

• None

🌎 Funding By Country

• $67.0M for the United States across 2 deals

• $2.0M for the United Kingdom across 1 deal

🤝 Mergers & Acquisitions

Product Companies:

• Findings, a United States-based automated third-party risk assessment platform, was acquired by Diginex for $305.0M. Findings has not previously disclosed any funding events. (more)

• Kondukto, a United States-based application security orchestration platform, was acquired by Invicti Security for an undisclosed amount. Kondukto had previously raised $1.0M in funding. (more)

Service Companies:

• QinetiQ Group's - Federal Information Technology Services Business, a United Kingdom-based professional services firm focused on cybersecurity services for the U.S. federal sector, was acquired by V2X for $31.0M. QinetiQ Group's - Federal Information Technology Services Business has not previously disclosed any funding events. (more)

• CyberCX, an Australia-based professional services firm focused on cyber threat assessments and compliance, was acquired by Accenture for an undisclosed amount. CyberCX has not previously disclosed any funding events. (more)

📚 Great Reads

🧪 Labs