Cyberstarts
Gili has been a valued first investor and mentor for more than 20 companies including Armis, Moovit, Adallom, Onavo, Wiz, Fireblocks, and many more.
Gili brings his vast hands-on experience to every investment, having built two enterprise software companies from zero to acquisitions by EMC and IBM. He won the coveted Israel Defense Presidential Prize in 1996 for his decade of service for the Israeli intelligence agency and the Israeli Defense Forces Innovation Award
in 1992.
Gili is the recognized inventor of the CAPTCHA, one of the world’s most popular security algorithms, built the first WAF (web application firewall) and holds 10 other US patents in the fields of security and application management. It is Gili’s passion and pleasure to share this breadth and depth of experience with Cyberstarts founders through their journeys.
Gili is an avid sports enthusiast – especially soccer and basketball. Watching, not practicing.
Gili is also a General Partner at Sequoia Capital since 2009.
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Cyberstarts
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Cyberstarts is a venture capital fund focused solely on early-stage cybersecurity startups. Since launching in 2018, founder Gili Raanan and the Cyberstarts team have partnered with driven entrepreneurs to build foundational companies in the cybersecurity space. At the core of Cyberstarts’ approach is the Sunrise Program, a hands-on initiative that equips founders with operational guidance, in-depth sector knowledge, and access to an influential group of top-tier CISOs. By 2025, the firm has raised more than $720 million across five funds. Its portfolio includes some of the most valuable private cybersecurity companies worldwide, among them Wiz, Fireblocks, Island, Cyera, and Transmit Security—collectively representing nearly half of the sector’s global private market capitalization, with a total valuation exceeding $55 billion. Headquartered in Tel Aviv, Cyberstarts works closely with cybersecurity innovators across the globe and is recognized as a trusted partner to many of the industry’s most impactful founders.