Upwind Founders
Upwind raised $250 million in Series B funding at a $1.5 billion valuation, joining the unicorn club after achieving 900 percent year-over-year revenue growth and 200 percent customer growth since its $100 million Series A just one year ago. The round was led by Bessemer Venture Partners with participation from Salesforce Ventures, Picture Capital, and existing investors including Greylock, Cyberstarts, Leaders Fund, Craft Ventures, TCV, Alta Park, Cerca Partners, Swish Ventures, and Penny Jar Capital backed by NBA star Stephen Curry.
Founded in 2022 by CEO Amiram Shachar and the team behind Spot.io which sold to NetApp for $450 million in 2020, Upwind has emerged as one of the fastest-growing independent cloud security companies by pioneering runtime-first security approaches. The company's total funding now reaches $430 million, with the previous $100 million round in December 2024 valuing the company at $850 million to $900 million.
Upwind's platform addresses fundamental limitations in traditional cloud security models that rely on static analysis and configuration scanning. The company argues cloud infrastructure has evolved faster than security models designed to protect it, requiring runtime-first approaches that analyze actual cloud environment behavior rather than predicted threats. This methodology helps security teams eliminate alert noise, prioritize genuine risks, and protect modern cloud applications more accurately without slowing business operations.
The platform consolidates multiple security functions including Cloud Security Posture Management, Cloud Workload Protection, Cloud Detection and Response, vulnerability management, identity security, and container security into a unified Cloud-Native Application Protection Platform. This consolidation addresses enterprise frustration with managing dozens of disconnected security tools that generate overlapping alerts and require separate vendor relationships.
Global enterprises including Waste Management, Siemens, Carvana, Roku, ClickUp, Wix, Nubank, Agoda, Peloton, Fiverr, and BILL now use Upwind to secure millions of workloads. The company doubled its workforce from 150 to over 300 employees during the past year while expanding presence across the United States, United Kingdom, and Israel with growing momentum in Australia, India, Singapore, and Japan.
Gideon Hayden, co-founder and managing partner at Leaders Fund, emphasized his firm has consistently doubled down on Upwind since the Spot.io days as execution validated their thesis. He characterized the shift away from static security approaches as inevitable in AI-powered, real-time cloud environments, positioning Upwind as purpose-built for modern cloud operations and setting the standard in cybersecurity's largest market segment.
Morgan Gerlak, partner at TCV Velocity, framed cloud security as a market that can compound over decades, with Upwind positioned as a company capable of sustained long-term growth. The $250 million investment size suggests institutional conviction extends beyond TCV to the broader investor base participating at the $1.5 billion valuation.
Vidu Shanmugarajah, general partner at Google Ventures which has backed Upwind since Series B, noted enterprises have moved beyond questioning whether to adopt AI for security to focusing on implementation speed, breadth of use, and workflow integration depth. He expressed growing conviction that Upwind possesses the product, team, and traction to become the category leader in AI-powered security experiences.
The funding comes as cloud security experiences rapid consolidation, with legacy vendors acquiring point solutions and newer entrants like Upwind challenging established approaches. Upwind reportedly fielded a $1 billion acquisition offer from Datadog in July 2025 but opted to remain independent and continue building. In April 2025, Upwind acquired Nyx Security, an Israeli startup specializing in real-time application security, expanding platform capabilities.
CEO Shachar describes the round as launching "The Next Wave" focused on scaling runtime-first cloud security to enable a new era of AI and real-time cloud applications for enterprises globally. The company positions runtime evidence as the only viable method to secure cloud environments during the AI era when workload complexity and scale exceed human capacity for manual security management.
