Upwind Security: The Inside-Out Approach to Cloud Security

Upwind Security, a cloud security startup, has achieved a valuation of $1.5 billion in just four years. The company counts Siemens, Peloton, Roku, Wix, Nextdoor, and Nubank among its clients. However, the co-founder and CEO, Amiram Shachar, revealed that the journey to success was riddled with uncertainties and challenges. Upwind's innovative 'runtime' security approach prioritizes real-time threats and vulnerabilities within active services. This unique inside-out perspective presents internal signals like network requests and API traffic as context to distinguish urgent risks from less critical ones.

Despite not having a traditional security background, Shachar and his team drew from their experience in cloud computing to identify the limitations of external scanning methods. Upwind's 'inside-out' model faced initial skepticism due to the prevailing 'outside-in' approach and the crowded security market. Nevertheless, the company's focus on building a broad, integrated platform resonated with large, data-intensive organizations, leading to significant growth since its Series A funding.

The recent $250 million Series B, led by Bessemer Venture Partners, will fuel product development, go-to-market efforts, and advancements in AI security capabilities. Upwind plans to enhance its cloud security platform and extend its approach to collaborate more closely with developers to prevent misconfigurations before they impact production.