Israeli-founded cyber startup raises $250m, attains unicorn status at $1.5b valuation
Israeli-founded cyber startup raises $250m, attains unicorn status at $1.5b valuation
Publish Date: 2026-01-26 10:18:00
Source Domain: www.timesofisrael.com
Using an unordered list, summarize the following article with between 4 and 8 key points.
Israeli-founded cybersecurity startup Upwind Security said Monday it had nabbed $250 million in fresh capital from investors, giving it a valuation of $1.5 billion.
The fresh investment makes the Tel Aviv startup a new Israeli “unicorn” — a company valued at $1 billion and above. Israel is home to 39 tech unicorns as of the end of 2025, according to data from the Israel Innovation Authority.
The funding round was led by global venture capital fund Bessemer Venture Partners, with participation of Israeli-founded venture capital firm Picture Capital. The round brings Upwind’s total funding to $430 million.
At its previous funding round in December 2024, the startup raised $100 million from investors at a company valuation of $900 million to expand operations across its offices in Israel, the US, and the UK, meet growing demand for protecting cloud applications, and double its workforce. Upwind currently employs about 300 workers, with 150 based in Israel.
Headquartered in San Francisco with offices in Tel Aviv, Upwind was founded in 2022 by serial entrepreneur Amiram Shachar, together with Liran Polak, Lavi Ferdman and Tal Zuri. The same team previously founded Israeli startup Spot.io, which was sold to NetApp for $450 million in 2020. The startup is named after Shachar’s love of wing foiling, a water sport that combines elements of windsurfing, hydrofoiling, and kitesurfing.
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Upwind has developed a platform to protect businesses from malicious hackers by identifying risks and addressing the most critical vulnerabilities and threats to their applications and workloads while they are actively running in the cloud. The platform helps businesses manage alert noise, including false alarms triggered by detection tools, and respond faster to actual threats and causes of security issues in their software systems. It enables security teams to minimize 98% of alert noise load, Upwind said.
Illustrative: Hacker using laptop on abstract binary code map background. (Peshkov/ iStock, by Getty Images)
“Cloud infrastructures have evolved far faster than the security models designed to protect them,” said Shahar, who also serves as Upwind’s CEO. “The next generation of cloud security requires a fundamentally different method with a runtime-first approach, which is the only way to protect the cloud during the AI era.
“The company’s approach enables security teams to eliminate [alert] noises, while focusing on real risks and protecting modern cloud applications more accurately and efficiently,” Shahar added.
The startup said it will invest the freshly raised capital into “massive product and engineering growth and go to market expansion,” as it views the “cloud security opportunity as the biggest one in the cybersecurity space.”
Upwind is among a host of cybersecurity companies benefiting from ample demand for security solutions bolstered by the fast emergence and adoption of AI-powered tools and software by businesses and organizations as they move to cloud services.
The digital transformation and migration of businesses to cloud environments have increased the need for the protection of critical and sensitive data in the face of heightened network security risks, including sophisticated ransomware, malware, and other breaches.
Upwind said that over the past year, it experienced revenue growth of about 900 percent as its customer base increased by about 200%. The startup’s cloud security platform is deployed by security teams at global companies such as Siemens, Peloton, Roku, Booking.com, Abnormal AI, and digital bank NuBank.
Upwind is backed by Craft Ventures, a venture capital firm co-founded by David Sacks; investors TCV and Alta Park Capital; Greylock; Gili Raanan’s Cyberstarts; Leaders Fund; Cerca; and Sheva, founded by former NBA player Omri Casspi.
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