Cyberstarts

Cyberstarts is a Tel Aviv-based seed stage venture capital firm focused exclusively on cybersecurity, founded by Gili Raanan, a veteran cybersecurity investor and former general partner at Sequoia Capital Israel, built around a distinctive model in which the firm co-founds companies alongside experienced cybersecurity operators and CISO networks before the company has a product or sometimes even a founding team fully assembled. Cyberstarts identifies market problems through a systematic process of interviewing hundreds of Chief Information Security Officers at major enterprises, synthesizing these conversations into problem areas where no existing solution adequately addresses a real need, and then recruiting technical founders to build companies solving those specific problems with the market demand already validated. This founder-and-CISO network gives portfolio company founders access to a pre-built network of enterprise security buyers who have already validated the problem. Cyberstarts typically leads seed rounds with checks from $2 million to $10 million. Portfolio companies include Apiiro, the code risk platform for application security; Orca Security, the agentless cloud security platform that became a unicorn; Talon Cyber Security, the enterprise browser security platform acquired by Palo Alto Networks in 2023; and Wiz, the cloud security platform co-founded by Assaf Rappaport, which reached a $12 billion valuation before being acquired by Google for $32 billion in 2025 in one of the largest technology acquisitions in history. Beyond its original investments in Apiiro, Orca Security, Talon, and Wiz, the portfolio includes additional Israeli and global cybersecurity companies.