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YL Ventures

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YL Ventures
IndustryVenture Capital Firm
Founded2007
FoundersYoav Leitersdorf
John Quigley
HeadquartersSan Francisco and Tel Aviv
Websitewww.ylventures.com

YL Ventures is an American-Israeli venture capital firm that specializes in seed stage cybersecurity investments.[1]

Investment Firm

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YL Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital firm. The company’s managing partner Yoav Leitersdorf[2] who founded the firm with John Quigley in 2007, along with Israel and U.S. partners Ofer Schreiber and John Brennan.[1][3] Current partners also include Sharon Seeman and Michael Cortez.[4] The firm has headquarters in San Francisco and Tel Aviv.[5][6] A main focus of YL Ventures is to introduce Israeli cybersecurity start-ups to the American market and develop a U.S. customer base.[1][7]

In 2018, YL Ventures established its Venture Advisory Board. As of 2021, the Venture Advisory Board had included northward of 100 global CISOs and cybersecurity executives from Fortune 100 companies, that assist YL Ventures in vetting investments and provide ideation support before the investment occurs.[6]

In 2019, YL Ventures inaugurated a CISO-in-Residence role.[8] Roger Hale served as YL Ventures’ first CISO-in-Residence.[9] In 2020, Sounil Yu took the role[10] and in 2021, Ryan Gurney replaced him.[11] The CISO-in-Residence for 2022 is Frank Kim.[12] YL Ventures was ranked 8th out of over 250 venture capital firms in PitchBook’s 2022 Global Manager Performance Score League Tables.[13]

Finances

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As of 2020, YL Ventures manages over $300 million across 4 funds,[14] including a $135 million fund raised in 2019[15] and a $75 million fund raised in 2017.[16] By 2023 this had increased to $800 million across 5 funds.[17]

Exits

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Company Field Description Exit Year Exit Details
Enso Security Application Security Posture Management 2023 Acquired by Snyk[18]
Spera Identity Security Posture Management Identity threat prevention, detection, and response 2023 Acquired by Okta for $100M[19]
Medigate Healthcare IoT Security Dedicated Healthcare IoT Security Platform 2021 Acquired by Claroty for $400M[20]
Build Security Authorization Policy Management Identity & access management platform 2021 Acquired by Elastic for an undisclosed amount[21]
Axonius Unified Visibility & Control Of Endpoint Devices Cybersecurity asset management platform 2021 Acquired by ICONIQ Growth, Alkeon Capital, DTCP, and Harmony Partners for $270M[15]
Twistlock Virtual Container Security Enterprise platform for cloud native workloads 2019 Acquired by Palo Alto Networks for $410M[22]
Upstream Commerce Online Retail Intelligence Retail pricing optimization and intelligence 2018 Acquired by Walmart (Flipkart) for an undisclosed amount[23]
Hexadite Cybersecurity Orchestration and Automation Automated incident response solution 2017 Acquired by Microsoft for $100M[24]
Seculert Cloud-based Malware Protection Attack detection and analytics platform 2017 Acquired by Radware for an undisclosed amount[25]
Firelayers Cloud Access Security Broker IT protection for cloud applications 2016 Acquired by Proofpoint for $55M[26]
BlazeMeter Performance Testing JMeter and performance testing platform for DevOps 2016 Acquired by CA Technologies for $90M[27]
Clicktale Web Analytics Customers experience analytics platform 2013 Acquired by Amadeus Capital
AcceloWeb Web Acceleration Pioneer and leader in browsing experience optimization 2011 Acquired by Limelight Networks for an undisclosed amount[28]

References

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  1. ^ a b c "YL Ventures, a specialist in Israeli cybersecurity startups, has closed its fourth fund with $120 million". TechCrunch. 10 July 2019. Retrieved 2021-01-26.
  2. ^ "Yoav Leitersdorf: YL Ventures' founder and fighter". CTech. Calcalist. 30 November 2020. Retrieved 18 January 2021.
  3. ^ Brennan, John (2020-08-13). "Navigating the critical step of making your first cybersecurity sales hire". CTECH - www.calcalistech.com. Retrieved 2021-10-03.
  4. ^ "YL Ventures announces $400 million fifth fund, the largest Seed stage cybersecurity-focused fund ever raised". ctech. 2022-05-10. Retrieved 2024-07-11.
  5. ^ "Ryan Gurney joins YL Ventures as CISO-in-Residence". Security Magazine. 16 June 2021.
  6. ^ a b "Ryan Gurney, Ex-Googler, Joins YL Ventures as CISO-in-Residence". finance.yahoo.com. Retrieved 2021-11-10.
  7. ^ "YL Ventures closes $75 million fund to bring Israeli startups to the US". Tech Crunch. 4 May 2017.
  8. ^ FinSMEs (2019-10-29). "YL Ventures Adds Roger Hale as CISO-in-Residence". FinSMEs. Retrieved 2021-09-30.
  9. ^ Orbach, Meir (2019-10-29). "Cybersecurity Veteran Roger Hale Joins Venture Capital Firm YL Ventures". CTECH - www.calcalistech.com. Retrieved 2021-09-30.
  10. ^ FinSMEs (2020-04-08). "Sounil Yu Joins YL Ventures as CISO-in-Residence". FinSMEs. Retrieved 2021-09-30.
  11. ^ CTech (2021-06-15). "Ryan Gurney, ex-Googler, joins YL Ventures as CISO-in-Residence". CTECH - www.calcalistech.com. Retrieved 2021-09-30.
  12. ^ "Frank Kim of SANS Institute joins YL Ventures as its new CISO-in-Residence". 17 November 2022.
  13. ^ https://pitchbook.com/news/reports/2022-pitchbook-global-manager-performance-score-league-tables[dead link‍]
  14. ^ Orbach, Meir (2021-03-09). "YL Ventures makes massive profit selling holdings in cybersecurity startup Axonius for $270 million". CTECH - www.calcalistech.com. Retrieved 2021-03-18.
  15. ^ a b "YL Ventures didn't wait for the IPO, and sold stake in Israeli Unicorn". Geektime. 2021-03-15. Retrieved 2021-03-18.
  16. ^ "YL Ventures closes $75 million fund to bring Israeli startups to the US". TechCrunch. 4 May 2017. Retrieved 2021-03-18.
  17. ^ Loizos, Connie (2022-05-12). "YL Ventures specializes in seed-stage cybersecurity investments". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2024-07-11.
  18. ^ "Cyber unicorn Snyk acquiring Israeli startup Enso Security for over $50 million". ctech. 2023-06-08. Retrieved 2024-07-11.
  19. ^ "Okta acquiring cybersecurity startup Spera for over $100 million". 19 December 2023.
  20. ^ "Claroty Buys Startup Medigate, Raises $400M From SoftBank".
  21. ^ "Elastic acquires build.security for security policy definition and enforcement". TechCrunch. 23 August 2021. Retrieved 2021-09-13.
  22. ^ "Palo Alto Networks to acquire container security startup Twistlock for $410M". TechCrunch. 29 May 2019. Retrieved 2021-01-25.
  23. ^ Leitersdorf, Yoav (2018-09-30). "Why Flipkart Is Acquiring Israel-based Upstream Commerce". CTECH - www.calcalistech.com. Retrieved 2021-01-25.
  24. ^ "Microsoft to buy Israeli security firm Hexadite, sources say for $100M". TechCrunch. 8 June 2017. Retrieved 2021-01-25.
  25. ^ "Radware Acquires Threat Detection firm Seculert | SecurityWeek.Com". www.securityweek.com. Retrieved 2021-01-25.
  26. ^ "Proofpoint buys cloud security co FireLayers". Globes. 2016-10-21. Retrieved 2021-01-25.
  27. ^ "CA Technologies to acquire Israeli startup BlazeMeter for $90 million". Haaretz.com. Retrieved 2021-01-25.
  28. ^ "Limelight Buys Web And Application Acceleration Technology Startup AcceloWeb". TechCrunch. 9 May 2011. Retrieved 2021-01-25.
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