# Jeyappragash Jj

> Jeyappragash 'JJ' Jeyakeerthi is the co-founder and CTO of Tetrate, the company that made Istio enterprise-ready and brought FIPS-verified service mesh to regulated industries including the US federal government. An IIT Madras graduate who once ran Twitter's Cloud Infrastructure, JJ co-founded Tetrate in 2018 with Varun Talwar to secure the cloud-native stack from edge to datacenter - building one of the most technically credible teams in the service mesh ecosystem, trusted by the US Air Force and some of the world's largest enterprises.

- **Role:** Co-Founder & CTO at Tetrate
- **Organizations:** Tetrate, Twitter, Motorola
- **Nationality:** Indian-American
- **Education:** M.Tech in Electrical Engineering, IIT Madras (Indian Institute of Technology Madras)
- **Known for:** Co-founded Tetrate, raising $52.5M total funding including $40M Series B, Built the first FIPS 140-2 verified distribution of Istio, Led the team to achieve inclusion in the US Government's Iron Bank repository

## Career timeline

- **pre-2018** — Engineer at Motorola - built Notification Infrastructure, Software Upgrade services, and Prospective Search-based Content Delivery Service
- **pre-2018** — Led Cloud Infrastructure Management Platform at Twitter
- **2018** — Co-founded Tetrate with Varun Talwar to build enterprise-grade Istio and Envoy-based service mesh
- **2020** — Launched annual NIST|Tetrate Conference on zero trust architecture and service mesh
- **2021** — Closed $40M Series B funding round led by Sapphire Ventures (March)
- **2022** — Achieved first FIPS 140-2 verified build for Istio; Tetrate Istio Distro added to US Government Iron Bank
- **2023** — Co-hosted Fourth Annual NIST|Tetrate Conference on Zero Trust Architecture in Washington D.C.
- **2024-2025** — Oversaw growth of Envoy AI Gateway community from v0.1 to v0.4, expanding AI infrastructure management capabilities

## Achievements

- Co-founded Tetrate, raising $52.5M total funding including $40M Series B
- Built the first FIPS 140-2 verified distribution of Istio
- Led the team to achieve inclusion in the US Government's Iron Bank repository
- Assembled a team that includes the original founders and top maintainers of Istio, Envoy, and SkyWalking open-source projects
- Secured US Air Force as a customer for zero-trust service mesh architecture
- Tetrate recognized by Forbes as 'America's Best Startup Employers' for two consecutive years
- Co-hosted annual NIST|Tetrate Conference on Zero Trust Architecture since 2020
- Led Tetrate to Gartner Cool Vendor status
- Contributed to NIST Special Publications SP 800-204A and SP 800-204B on service mesh security

## Latest updates

- **2025-01** — Overseeing Envoy AI Gateway project growth from v0.1 to v0.4 with an expanding contributor and user base
- **2023-05** — Co-hosted the Fourth Annual NIST|Tetrate Conference on Zero Trust Architecture in Washington D.C.
- **2022-04** — Announced Tetrate Istio Distro achieving FIPS 140-2 certification - the first for any Istio distribution

## Links

- Website: https://tetrate.io
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pragashjj/

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/jeyappragash-jj
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-05-26