Secure Ventures with Kyle McNulty

Roy:

Check out the episode for our conversation about how cars can be exploited, what companies can do about it, and how charging stations and autonomous vehicles present new threats.

https://c2a-sec.com/

Gary:

Check out the episode for our conversation on the value of cash-flowing cybersecurity businesses, the strategy of acquiring a portfolio of products, and the opportunities in consumer security.

Links:

Rob:

Brad:

Check out the episode for our discussion on the state of industry research via firms like Gartner and how the market is adapting with other alternatives.

Links:

Alex:

Check out the episode for our discussion on pivoting a consulting business and risk contextualization.

Links:

Gal:

We discuss consulting as a way of marketing your start-up, Gal's legacy as a founder, and the technical challenges in building Authomize. Enjoy!

Marc:

Listen to the episode for our discussion on the formation of IBM security, the challenges with taking over a company and team during COVID, and current market conditions in the security space as told by a CEO that lives and breathes this market.

While the Ukraine/Russia conflict lasts, there is increased uncertainty about what the future holds. In this episode, Karim Hijazi (CEO and Founder of Prevailion) and I discuss the cyber conflict in full. Precedent in previous cyber war, how the cyber conflict has unfolded so far, how attackers (both directly and indirectly involved) are responding, and what might unfold in various escalation paths. 

His first episode on Secure Ventures was episode #2, and you can find it on whatever app you are using to listen to this one!

Some additional reading material based on what we discussed:

Scott:

Listen to the episode for our discussion on his contributions to the family business since childhood, the physical security needs of today, and his contributions back to the community across a variety of media facets.

Johanna:

Listen to the episode for our discussion of consulting principles, the relevance of customer industries for cybersecurity consulting, and growing a consultancy through word of mouth.

Harshil:
- Co-founder and CEO at Tromzo
- Co-founder of SVCI (Silicon Valley CISO Investments)
- Previously Senior Director of Security at Medallia

Listen to the episode for our discussion on starting a company in stealth, organizing CISOs as investors, raising money with only an idea, and more.

https://www.tromzo.com/

https://www.svci.io/

Shawn:
- Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) at World Fuel Services
- Previously the first CISO at US Marine Corps Intelligence
- Advisor in the startup ecosystem

Listen to the episode for our discussion ranging from analogies between motorcycles and cybersecurity risk management, growing a cybersecurity team, and specific differences between working in government and the private sector.

Troy:

Al:

SafeBase:

"The Interactive Security Portal" - SafeBase is a security resume for your organization to share key cybersecurity certifications and capabilities with customers in a streamlined fashion.

Reuven:

CYE:

CYE brings a fact-based approach to organizational cyber defense, managing real business risks and optimizing the cybersecurity investment. CYE serves as a trusted advisor to medium-sized and Fortune 500 companies in multiple industries around the world.

https://cyesec.com/index.html

Hugo:

rThreat:

Alex:

Archis:

Polyverse:

Ike:

TidalScale:

Michael is the CEO of Virta Labs, a healthcare security company building a platform for medical device management. He also founded his own consultancy to help start-ups acquire funding through traditional and non-dilutive mechanisms like government grants. He’s especially well-versed in the financial and legal aspects of startups which are tricky for so many founders.

With me in this episode is Eric Cole. Eric is the CEO and Founder of Secure Anchor Consulting, where he has provided guidance for companies of all sizes and the Obama administration. He is also an established author who will have a total of 8 published books after the release of Cyber Crisis at the start of June. In the episode we dive into the common themes between entrepreneurship and authorship, and how he became successful in both.

Pre-order the book now on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Cyber-Crisis-Protecting-Business-Threats/dp/1950665836

The average professional's experience with cybersecurity generally involves phishing training, and that is a brutally dry introduction.

Oz Alashe at Cybsafe is working to revolutionize the world of security training, and he won't stop until he has influenced training across the globe. Listen to this episode for his embarrassing icon that influenced his joining the UK paratrooper regimen and his outlook for the future after raising $8 million earlier this year.

Pete is a guru in the entrepreneurship space. He is currently acting as VP of Business Development for two different companies and CEO of his own consultancy, all while acting as an advisor and board member for several others. Pete is a clear "people person", and his stories of innocent connection followed by subsequent business opportunities are incredulous. Tune in to hear about his recipes for success for start-ups that sometimes go against commonly accepted ideas.

As Wayne put it, security companies are often boring. To his credit, ThreatQuotient is far from it. The company has grown to over 100 employees since Wayne founded it with his coworker, Ryan Trost, back in 2013. The team has raised over $50 million in funding, and some portion of that has gone toward adopting three rhinoceroses, the company's logo and official mascot. On this episode, Wayne discusses his burning desire to become a founder before he succeeded with ThreatQuotient, the time commitment in a new venture, and the decision to step down from CEO in order to let the company continue its incredible growth trajectory. Enjoy!

While episodes so far focused on the stories of founders, in this episode I interview the hosts of the Extreme Uncertainty podcast, Mike Ravenscroft and Mike Leffer, who are prominent venture capitalists in the security space. The episode includes a glimpse into the untraditional routes into VC as well as several tips for founders looking for funding and idiosyncrasies of the security market when looking at potential investments. This is one of my favorite episodes so far, as it provides additional background as to the struggles of every founder I have interviewed on the show.

Their podcast can be found by searching "Extreme Uncertainty" wherever you listen to Secure Ventures, or on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/extreme-uncertainty/.

Vladi has been through the gamut of cybersecurity roles including experience with the military, teaching, consulting, product, and entrepreneurship. After quickly rising through the ranks of Israel's cyber security arm, he entered the private sector where he gave up his free time for several years as he worked in consulting during the day and on coursework at night, including founding a security program at his alma mater shortly after graduating. Now, Vladi is leading Lightspin in the red-hot cloud security space with a novel approach to defense through graph visualization. His company has been growing rapidly, and incredibly he has done this while keeping an even balance between men and women despite the male-dominated field. 

Sam is the youngest guest to join the show so far, having started his company Kasada while he was still a teenager. After experience working in the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) in high school, basically the NSA of Australia, Sam decided to forgo college ("university" for the Australians) in favor of going directly into the security world. Shortly after, he founded Kasada, which is built around a bot deterrence platform that presents complex quantitative challenges that cost attackers thousands in compute resources. Kasada has seen explosive growth, as it received funding from the CIA's venture group in its 2019 Series A, received a Series B in 2020, and now has over 50 employees.

After an early stint in the Air Force Reserves and then as an Algorithm Engineer, Guy's career then transformed after business school. He transitioned into Business Development, where he led the APAC expansion for Runcom Technologies and later Algosec. He was mentoring in an Australian cyber security accelerator, CyRise, when we was recruited by one of his mentees and now his Co-Founder. After a successful pivot, SecureStack is focusing on its product CloudBuilder, which enables secure templates for cloud deployments so the application attack surface can be rapidly reduced. SecureStack was recently named one of the top 20 cybersecurity firms to watch in 2021 by Forbes. 

After starting his career in the music industry including the creation of his own music festival, Festivus, Dean has woven a fascinating career out of his deep marketing expertise. With the new privacy regulation across the globe over the last several years, marketing efforts have become reliant on privacy compliance for effectiveness. Invisit is streamlining privacy compliance to ensure companies maximize the value of their marketing campaigns.

After a tongue-twisting liberal arts degree with two majors and two minors, Chrissa went on to pursue her dream of becoming a doctor. After a series of stints in healthcare, she found a passion for healthcare technology where she could influence a much wider landscape within healthcare. Her company, Patientory, is providing secure storage and access to consumer healthcare data through a mobile application so individuals can take ownership of their medical records.

From an early start in material sciences to serial product lead and strategist to trusted adviser in healthcare, Balaji has developed a fascinating career tackling each of his interests. While the healthcare industry is receiving more attention than ever, his company MedStack is simplifying healthcare security by providing an automated platform for deployment and infrastructure management.

In the wake of the recent SolarWinds incident, never has Karim Hijazi been so busy. Karim started his career in photography and then quickly transitioned into starting his own security consultancy. Since then, he has had numerous interesting events including a public battle with Lulzsec in 2011. Now, his company Prevailion is in the spotlight more than ever due to its novel approach to supplier security.

Ari Jacoby went to college thinking he would enter politics, but he soon found the entrepreneurial itch. Many years later, he has now led four successful exits as he embarks on his first venture into security, Deduce. Deduce is democratizing account takeover detection and prevention capabilities, such as notifications after logins from a new location, so smaller businesses can leverage similar functionality to that at major technology companies such as Apple, Facebook, and Google.