Cyber Mentor Fund is a seed stage, cyber security focused Mentorship Fund

that has built the most non-traditional, insightful, and tenacious product for

cyber security founders to fulfill their radical missions.

Mission & Values

Remaining humble, kind, and true to the entrepreneurial spirit, we see success as a disciplined team sport. In order to win, we need to work hard together, fighting shoulder to shoulder with everyone in our community. We understand the journey is part of the reward and expect the same disciplined drive from our portfolio companies to our Limited Partners and beyond. Our mission is to support the most robust and aggressive security solutions for the enterprise because when our companies win, everyone wins, making the world a more secure place for all.

To succeed as a Mentorship Fund, we build the bridge between up-and-coming entrepreneurs and the enterprises that they serve by working within an ecosystem of the best. We leverage a focused community-centered approach, working with the most impactful Chief Information Security Officers, leading technologists, seasoned entrepreneurs, and successful executives. Further, by partnering with domain relevant and leading VCs/Angels/Investors, Cyber Mentorship Fund is better positioned to drive growth while our portfolio companies are building a coalition they can trust.

Cyber Mentor Fund bets money, aggressive effort, and our community on entrepreneurs to help solve complex problems in cyber security. By supporting these entrepreneurs and their emerging novel technologies, we are pushing the limits of cyber security solutions.

What We Do

Capital

CMF dedicates money, time, and expertise to support the next-generation of cyber security leaders.

Access

CMF’s network of experts and Fellow Founder’s industry prowess provides exclusive access for both LPs and our portfolio. By prioritizing an intimate community-centered relationship within the fund, we are able to better influence and provide cutting edge solutions to everyone involved. 

Early Adoption

CMF works fast to help our portfolio grow. The synergy between CMF’s strong community of early adopters and our specialized focus at the seed stage allows for the largest impact to the industry and the future of cyber security. 

CMF Catapult Program

We believe the most impactful growth comes from a frictionless playing field. The CMF Catapult Program strives to reduce the friction points through insight, access, mentoring, and being teammates in the fight. The bad guys move fast, but we want the good guys to move faster.

Our Catapult Program uniquely offers hands-on support, exclusive partnerships, and expertise to entrepreneurs, helping their startups jump through the early-stage minefield of going to market. The program is designed to catapult start-ups to the next stage of business development with a three phase approach: Ready, Aim, Launch

READY

In phase one, we help to identify an initial concept’s product market fit:

  • Identify product positioning, architecture, differentiations
  • Build product validation strategies, gaining feedback from leading early adopters
  • Support extensive competitive analysis
  • Help align demo with the positioning strategy
  • Define early stage pricing and financial model

AIM

In phase 2, we apply an intensive GTM validation process with the support of our network of experts and early adopters:

  • Define proper sales strategies, sales channels, channel partners
  • Identify start-up’s key market segment and solidify a focused product marketing strategy
  • Introduce start-up to the proper ecosystem of partners and allies aligned to support and test product
  • Support creation of financing plans and future fundraising models
  • Identify path forward into adjacent opportunities

LAUNCH

In phase 3, we put a team together to drive the accelerated go-to-market efforts:

  • Leverage CMF community of industry experts and thought leaders to publicly validate product and market need
  • Support partnership announcement and key integrations through joint blogs, webinars, video testimonials
  • Build thought leadership, corporate marketing, and product focused collateral including blogs, whitepapers, and datasheets
  • Participate in CMF virtual and public facing events at leading cybersecurity conferences and within CMF Misfit Panel discussions

Automated Alert Triage with Kognos

With Kognos’ Automated Alert Triage, security teams no longer have to choose between lower false positives and lower false negatives, they get both. Even with the increase in endpoints produced within the distributed workforce.

Integrating with Leading Endpoint Security Products – SecurityAdvisor

By integrating with leading endpoint security technology, SecurityAdvisor is able to provide just-in-time security awareness training to end users the moment an incident occurs.

Mark Weatherford Explains the Power of Relationships with Kognos

Leveraging the power of relationships to autonomously investigate attack campaigns.

Who We Are

CMF Team

Fellow Founder

Tim Eades

Fellow Founder

Fellow Founder

Joe Eandi

Fellow Founder

Venture Associate

Muriel Kay

Venture Associate

Marketing Associate

Emma Peters

Marketing Associate

Marketing Associate

Julia Pardee

Marketing Associate

Cyber Mentor Fund takes pride in the entrepreneurial experience because that is who we are. As Fellow Founders, we have gained industry knowledge through high-level experiences. Through founding cyber security companies and mentoring  other start-ups, we have experienced and identified the inefficiency of bringing cyber security start-ups to market and built a unique growth roadmap to overcome those inefficiencies. Our roadmap is the foundation of a disciplined, insightful, and hardcore investment and mentorship model. 

01

Strong Investment History

CMF Fellow Founder’s collective investment:

  • 20+ cyber security companies
  • 40+ private companies

02

Successful Investment Exits

  • We have guided multiple cyber security companies to successful liquidity events.
  • CMF Fellow Founders know what sells, what will likely be an exit, and what will not. 

03

Prolific Seed Investors

CMF has invaluable knowledge into market dynamics and need-based learnings on what the next generation of cyber security solutions will address.  

04

CMF Network of Advisors

  • Cyber Security Founders
  • Corporate Execs – CISOs, CIOs, CTOs
  • Industry Leaders
  • Cyber Investors
  • Tech Experts

05

Fellow Founder’s Deep Cyber Knowledge

  • Active investors, advisors, and executives in the industry.
  • We have a robust, constant inbound pipeline of cyber security startups. 

Our Companies

Cyber Mentor Fund invests under a disciplined investment model. We undertake focused diligence including experts from our network to understand the team, technology, and market. We target investing at the seed stage, focusing on business-to-business, business-to-business-consumer, cyber security software for the enterprise – excluding hardware, end-point, consumer products. 

Ananda Networks

allows organizations to create their own private networks, connecting all users, devices, and services with the industry’s first Secure Global-LAN

How We’ve Helped: Since our introduction, CMF sourced a key strategic investor, introduced customers focusing on early adoption and provided speaking engagements in front of enterprise buyers and potential future investors.

Initial Round: Seed
Blue Lava

transforms existing compliance-focused risk assessment into an effective, enterprise-wide security evaluation.

Initial Round: Series B
Bolster

is artificial intelligence powered zero day brand protection that puts an end to counterfeit websites targeting your brand.

How We’ve Helped: CMF has proven successful in mentoring founders throughout start-up lifecycle stages, scouted investors, and introduced to new Fortune 500 customer in travel and lodging space.

Initial Round: Series A
CalypsoAI

solves complex AI risks for national security and highly-regulated industries.

Initial Round: Seed & Series A
Certn

accelerates the global trust economy and simplifying the hiring process with a human risk intelligence solution

Initial Round: Series A+
Cyberhaven

protects trade secrets, intellectual property, and client data against negligent users and malicious insiders.

Initial Round: Series A
CyCognito

offers autonomous attack surface testing to find blind spots and mitigate exposed attack vectors.

Initial Round: Series A
DeepView

manages social media risk for regulated industries.

Initial Round: Seed
Dragos, Inc.

passively identifies assets and communications, detects industrial cyber security threats through behavioral analytics, and provides security teams with guided investigation and response.

Initial Round: Series B
Enveil

closes the last gap in data security by protecting Data in Use.

Initial Round: Seed
Hyas

understands cyber adversary infrastructure and communication to that infrastructure

Initial Round: Series B
Kognos

investigates, automates and scales manual investigations, eliminating investigative backlogs and prioritization bias to dramatically reduce dwell time and risk.

How We’ve Helped: Since investment, CMF introduced Kognos to its lead Series A investor, assisted with marketing and GTM strategy, and sourced Kognos’s first pilot.

Initial Round: Seed
MessageControl

harnesses artificial intelligence to stop social engineering and human identity attacks.

Initial Round: Seed
Okera

ensures the appropriate data access controls are in place to meet the evolving data privacy landscape of multi-cloud and hybrid cloud environments.

Initial Round: Series A+
Paladin Cyber

combines robust cyber security tools with broad insurance coverage to secure the SMB.

Initial Round: Seed
Resilience

enables insurance providers to scale their cyber line of business using curated security data for accuracy, AI for advanced risk assessment, and workflow automation for efficiency.

Initial Round: Series B
SecurityAdvisor

identifies and visualizes the human risk within an organization, and recommends tailored security awareness programs for employees to reduces the number of security incidents.

Initial Round: Seed & Series A
Stealth Security Start-Ups:

CMF invests in some kick-ass companies, a few of which are remaining in stealth mode.

Templarbit

The data backbone for third party and merchant risk assessments.

Initial Round: Series A

Community

Cyber Mentor Fund knows the synergy of community yields the largest impact. We leverage our network — advisors, limited partners, and friends — to support, educate, and promote the portfolio.

CMF brings together industry executives, early adopters, and thought leaders to join our portfolio for exclusive, high-end networking dinners. These intimate events provide an opportunity for our founders to grow as entrepreneurs, learn market needs, and showcase their domain expertise.

Global Executive Dinners

CMF brings together industry executives, early adopters, and thought leaders to join our portfolio for exclusive, high-end networking dinners. These intimate events provide an opportunity for our founders to grow as entrepreneurs, learn market needs, and showcase their domain expertise.

CMF hosts high-profile events surrounding cyber security conferences and conventions. We bring together industry leaders, executives, early adopters, and trusted customers to join in on panel conversations and networking lunches. In conjunction with a high-profile panel, the CMF portfolio is showcased through presentations and elevator pitches to the audience.

Cyber Security Conventions & Showcase Opportunities

CMF hosts high-profile events surrounding cyber security conferences and conventions. We bring together industry leaders, executives, early adopters, and trusted customers to join in on panel conversations and networking lunches. In conjunction with a high-profile panel, the CMF portfolio is showcased through presentations and elevator pitches to the audience.

Wavemakers in security never stop evolving. We host high-growth lunches, seminars, and other learning opportunities for founders and their team to reaffirm their mission, promote innovation as a company, and make sure they are always one step ahead of the bad guys.

CEO/Team Education Day

Wavemakers in security never stop evolving. We host high-growth lunches, seminars, and other learning opportunities for founders and their team to reaffirm their mission, promote innovation as a company, and make sure they are always one step ahead of the bad guys.

By hosting webinars, we offer an opportunity to promote portfolio domain expertise towards extended marketplaces, both nationally and internationally. Public facing education sessions promote warm customer leads and builds industry trust in our founders and their products.

Webinars

By hosting webinars, we offer an opportunity to promote portfolio domain expertise towards extended marketplaces, both nationally and internationally. Public facing education sessions promote warm customer leads and builds industry trust in our founders and their products.

The CMF portfolio is constantly supported within our ecosystem of experts with skin in the game help. Our experts are not only leaders in the industry but act as mentors, board members, and CorpDev advisors. Our founders interact with each other, creating a supportive growth environment. The synergy of the CMF Ecosystem supports higher results than just CMF capital alone. 

CMF Ecosystem

The CMF portfolio is constantly supported within our ecosystem of experts with skin in the game help. Our experts are not only leaders in the industry but act as mentors, board members, and CorpDev advisors. Our founders interact with each other, creating a supportive growth environment. The synergy of the CMF Ecosystem supports higher results than just CMF capital alone. 

Many of CMF’s LPs are experts or have a keen interest in cyber security. CMF creates many opportunities for bi-directional information sharing and assistance between our LPs and our portfolio companies.

Limited Partner Involvement

Many of CMF’s LPs are experts or have a keen interest in cyber security. CMF creates many opportunities for bi-directional information sharing and assistance between our LPs and our portfolio companies.

Twice yearly visits to AWS, Azure, VMWare, and others, helps form a close relationship with leading infrastructure and cloud providers. CMF founders gain an inside understanding and supported role within the ecosystem.

Infrastructure & Platform Days

Twice yearly visits to AWS, Azure, VMWare, and others, helps form a close relationship with leading infrastructure and cloud providers. CMF founders gain an inside understanding and supported role within the ecosystem.

Resources

As if the stresses and headaches of business travel weren’t enough, there’s one more thing to worry about while traveling in unfamiliar places…

Traveling for work? You’re a prime target for hackers

As if the stresses and headaches of business travel weren’t enough, there’s one more thing to worry about while traveling in unfamiliar places…

Read Blog

Over the past several months, the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) at…

Dragos Collaborates with NIST on New Cybersecurity Guide for Energy Sector Asset Management

Over the past several months, the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) at…

Read Blog

The recent anniversary of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)’s implementation…

Compliance Is The New Normal — It’s Time To Lock Down The Data

The recent anniversary of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR)’s implementation…

Visit Article

Prior to Kognos, our founding team was working at RSA, McAfee, Juniper and Dell with a combined experience of 100+ years in cyber security.

THINKING DIFFERENT – Why We Started Kognos?

Prior to Kognos, our founding team was working at RSA, McAfee, Juniper and Dell with a combined experience of 100+ years in cyber security.

Read Blog

Ever since the Great Recession, the financial services industry has been under intense scrutiny and regulation… 

Breaking the Bank: How Cybercrime Preys on Financial Services

Ever since the Great Recession, the financial services industry has been under intense scrutiny and regulation… 

Read Blog

Events

12.03.20

Navigating Cybersecurity Start-Up Sales in the age of a Distributed Workforce

As per the misfit way, we’ll cut to the chase and highlight how security startups can best attack the changed budgets. Our panel of misfit leaders will tell you exactly what works: how to sell, who to sell to, and what corporate cyber leaders need right now.
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09.24.20

Cybersecurity Budgets in the Age of the Distributed Workforce

This panel of misfit thinkers and budget handlers will look at what in security spending and budget allocation has been broken, where organizations are still engaging with innovative technology, and how budget handlers get shit done, fast.

download resource

06.03.20

Misfits + The State of Cybersecurity

Our panel of misfit CISOs and industry thought leaders will offer insights into their top of mind security concerns, why and where they will continue to adopt innovative, early technology, their pivoted priorities due to COVID impact, and will give advice to security entrepreneurs looking to get break into the market in this new environment. 

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02.25.20

CMF Presents: Early Adopter Meet Early Thinkers

A networking breakfast with a panel of high-powered security executives discussing the impact of early stage technology adoption. Offering insights to start-ups and security entrepreneurs looking to get involved with their first customers and executive offices and enterprises exploring early technology.

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01.21.21

People, Processes, and Product: A Misfit Look at the Cybersecurity Trends of 2021

The panel of misfit thinkers will look into the mistakes of histories past and present, and will be brutally honest how to stay ahead of the curve and prepare for the people, process, and product trends that are expected to shape 2021.

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