Making the Most of What You Already Have. Why I Joined Nagomi.

Today we've announced that Nagomi Security has emerged from Stealth with $30 million in funding. The company operated in stealth mode with Seed funding from Team8, and the recent round was led by TCV, with participation from CrowdStrike Falcon Fund and Okta Ventures. Nagomi is also backed by leading angel investors, including Shlomo Kramer, co-founder and CEO of Cato Networks, Nir Polak, co-founder and CEO of Exabeam, and Guy Podjarny, Founder of Snyk.

How I Got Here

After 6+ years of career-defining work at Axonius, I knew I had to get back to early stage. I am incredibly proud of what we were able to accomplish, the team we built, the product, and I have nothing but great things to say....I mean....I have a tattoo on my arm to prove it. Going from zero to $100 million in ARR is a massive accomplishment, and I can't say enough about the team that made it happen.

But it was time. I was always conscious of the fact that - at some point - there would be someone better to run marketing at a certain level of size and scale. Knowing that I love the early, chaotic stage from stealth to $100 million, balanced with knowing that there is someone out there that loves the $100+ million stage, it became clear to me that it was time to move on.

Start or Join?

When I made the decision to do something new, I had to choose whether to start something myself or join an existing startup. And I had an idea that was bothering me. Despite all of the tools we have in cybersecurity, how do we know whether they're actually providing value and working effectively? Other than the binary "did I get breached?" how can we tell whether what we buy is both working and providing value? And in both cases, how do we measure progress?

I had incredible guidance from investors that thought the problem space was interesting enough to explore. And when I spoke to one investor specifically, he said something like "not only do I love the problem space, I invested in a company a year ago that's working on exactly that problem. You should talk to them." So I did. And they were. So I am, too.

I Buy All This Stuff.......But Is It Working?

Cybersecurity is hard. You buy a bunch of tools, configure them on day one, and then move on to something else. But threats change, cyber criminals pivot, and tools add functionality over time. But with cybersecurity teams constantly stretched thin, and practitioners underwater with too many threats to possibly investigate it becomes incredibly difficult to ensure that the tools we have at our organizations are configured properly against the real-world threats targeting us.

What if there were a way to connect all of your security tools to a brain that:

1. Creates a unique threat profile for your organization - taking industry, geography, size, etc. into account.
2. Constantly monitors threats, campaigns, and TTPs that are being used in the wild.
3. Understands that a law firm in the UK is being targeted by different threat groups than a manufacturing plant in Australia, and using different attack vectors.
4. Looks at your security tools and defenses, and then maps to MITRE ATT&CK to understand where there are gaps, where there are opportunities for improvement, and then gives prescriptive remediation plans to move the needle.

That's what Nagomi does. By connecting to the security tools an organization already uses, it then compares that to threats like ransomware and phishing, then gets more granular looking at the specific threat actors and campaigns, analyzing the configuration of the stack, and providing evidence-based suggestions on how to decrease threat exposure.

How Big Is The Problem?

Big.

Much like it was in the early days at Axonius, every person I talk with has the problem. At Axonius I'd ask "how many devices do you have?" and would get either "I don't know" or "between 10 and 30,000." Here, when I ask "how do you know whether your security tools are effective against Black Cat ransomware, and do you have any exceptions? What about compensating controls?" I hear "It's incredibly manual, and we're trying to figure out how to solve it."

One of our customers put it best: "You buy a bunch of tools and have them configured perfectly on day one. But then you move on to other things, a year goes by, and you know that there are either new features or changes that could make your defenses more effective against changing threats. I want to know where my controls are degraded, where I am exposed, and what I can do to close that gap and move the needle."

Give It To Me Straight, Doc

I like an analogy, so here goes:

So How Do I See It?

Great question. We just emerged from stealth today, and our awesome new site is nagomi.security - huge thanks to the team at CNP who put up with my aggressive timeline and dumb questions. They really do great work (I've worked with them at 3 different companies).

And if you'll be at RSA, come see us! You can schedule a time here, or send a message and we'll find a time to talk!