dope.security is a Mountain View cybersecurity startup that rebuilt the Secure Web Gateway (SWG) so it runs directly on the endpoint instead of routing traffic through a vendor's cloud datacenter. Founded in 2021 by ex-Symantec and Forcepoint product leader Kunal Agarwal, its 'fly-direct' architecture inspects web traffic on-device, claiming faster performance, fewer outages, and better privacy than legacy cloud proxies. The company has expanded from its core dope.swg product into AI-powered data protection with CASB Neural and DOPAMINE DLP, backed by roughly $20M from GV (Google Ventures) and Boldstart Ventures.
AJ Herrera is the VP of Corporate Marketing at Cloudflare, where he leads the brand narrative that recast a CDN company into the world's connectivity cloud. With over 30 years in high-tech marketing spanning Silicon Graphics, a decade running his own agency, and seven years shaping VMware's global brand, he brings both the craftsman's instinct and the operator's eye to one of the internet's most consequential infrastructure companies.
Matthew Mullin is VP of Demand Generation at Cloudflare, the connectivity cloud and internet infrastructure company protecting millions of websites worldwide. Based in San Francisco, he leads pipeline creation strategy and buyer-centric demand programs for one of the most influential companies in global network security. Before Cloudflare, he spent over six years at Tenable building a marketing operations function from scratch, growing the team from 2 to 15+ professionals, winning a 2022 B2B Innovator Award from Demand Gen Report, and delivering a 40% pipeline increase through precision demand marketing. He is a self-described Boston sports fanatic transplanted to the Bay Area.
Menlo Security is a Mountain View-based cybersecurity company that pioneered cloud-based remote browser isolation and now sells a Secure Enterprise Browser used by global banks, governments and Fortune 500s to keep web-based malware, phishing and AI-era threats off employee endpoints.
Bill Robbins is the Chief Executive Officer of Menlo Security, a Mountain View-based cybersecurity company specializing in browser-based security and AI-driven threat prevention. With over 30 years of enterprise technology sales and leadership experience across Symantec, Nuance Communications, FireEye, Mandiant, and Sophos, Robbins joined Menlo as President in November 2024 and was elevated to CEO in February 2026 after helping the company surpass $140M in ARR. He now leads Menlo's push into AI agent security and agentic AI runtime protection, targeting the next wave of enterprise threats.
Ratan Tipirneni is President and CEO of Tigera, the company behind Project Calico - the open-source container networking and security project powering over 100 million containers across 8 million nodes in 166 countries. A serial entrepreneur with stints at Cisco, Actifio, Sun Microsystems, and SupportSoft, he joined Tigera in 2017 and has since grown it into the definitive platform for Kubernetes security, observability, and now AI workload protection.
Tigera is the creator of Calico, the open-source standard for Kubernetes networking and security that powers more than a million clusters every day. From its San Jose headquarters, the company sells Calico Cloud and Calico Enterprise - SaaS and on-prem platforms that bolt active runtime security, zero-trust microsegmentation, and observability onto container environments at any scale.
Blackpoint Cyber is a Denver-based managed detection and response (MDR) company built by former NSA cyber operations experts who decided the best way to defend businesses was to think like the attackers they used to be. Founded in 2014, the company serves managed service providers (MSPs) with a 24/7 security operations center, proprietary threat detection technology, and its unified CompassOne platform - combining endpoint, identity, cloud, and compliance tools into a single dashboard. With $210M in total funding and 23 G2 badges in Spring 2025, Blackpoint has become one of the most recognized MDR providers in the MSP channel, locking compromised Microsoft 365 accounts roughly every 30 minutes.
Corelight is a San Francisco-based cybersecurity company that pioneered the commercial Open NDR (Network Detection and Response) platform, built on Zeek - the gold-standard open-source network security monitor created by co-founder Dr. Vern Paxson at Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. By transforming raw network traffic into high-fidelity, structured logs and pairing them with AI-powered analytics, Corelight gives enterprise security teams and government agencies the evidence they need to detect, investigate, and respond to threats faster. With $309M in total funding, 40%+ ARR growth, and recognition as a Gartner Magic Quadrant Leader for NDR, Corelight is widely regarded as the most trusted platform for network-based threat detection.
Connie Tang is the CEO and founder of CCT Technologies Inc., operating as ComputerLand of Silicon Valley - a San Jose-based IT solutions firm she built from a storefront computer shop in 1991 into a 55-person enterprise serving government agencies, K-12 schools, higher education institutions, and commercial businesses across Northern California. After more than three decades at the helm, she led the company through a strategic acquisition by ISSQUARED Inc. in May 2024, positioning the combined entity to expand in cybersecurity, AI, and edge computing.
Barry Mainz is the CEO of Forescout Technologies, a San Jose-based cybersecurity company specializing in device visibility, OT/IoT security, and network access control. With over 30 years of executive leadership across infrastructure software and cybersecurity, he previously served as CEO of MobileIron, COO of Malwarebytes, and President of Wind River Systems (Intel). At Forescout, Mainz has driven the company to record growth, including a 20% increase in new recurring bookings and 38% DoD business expansion in 2024, while positioning the platform as the leading solution for cyber resilience across converging IT, OT, and IoT environments. He also sits on the Board of Directors of BlackBerry.
Bobby Bahl is the founder and CEO of teleSys Software, Inc., a San Mateo-based telecommunications software company he established in 1997. With over 40 years of industry experience, he led the deployment of the first SS7 signaling network in the United States at Sprint and managed the creation of Equal Access, the nation's first long-distance network. Under his leadership, teleSys has grown into a global provider of carrier-grade multi-generation signaling solutions, with 400+ installations serving 100+ operators across 80+ countries supporting more than 1 billion active subscribers.
Dhrupad Trivedi is the President, CEO, and Chairman of A10 Networks (NYSE: ATEN), a San Jose-based cybersecurity and application delivery company. With a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and an MBA in Finance from Duke's Fuqua School of Business, he brings over 30 years of deep technical and operational expertise across networking, cybersecurity, and telecommunications. Since taking the helm in December 2019, Trivedi has repositioned A10 as an AI-era security company — landing Microsoft as a customer to protect mission-critical generative AI infrastructure — while driving double-digit revenue growth and expanding the company's portfolio to include AI firewalls, DDoS protection, and next-generation web application firewalls.
Remko Vos is the CEO of CUJO AI, a cybersecurity and network intelligence platform protecting over 60 million homes globally by monitoring more than 3 billion connected devices. A Dutch-born engineer turned MIT Sloan MBA, Vos spent five years at Comcast before stepping into the CEO chair in April 2022, bringing rare firsthand experience as a CUJO AI customer to a company that blocks over 17,000 threats per minute. Under his leadership, CUJO AI has landed Tier-1 wins including T-Mobile USA and EE, earned recognition as a Cybersecurity Visionary at RSAC 2025, and become a voice at forums from the World Economic Forum to MWC.
Brian Dye is the CEO of Corelight, the network detection and response (NDR) company behind the enterprise deployment of Zeek, the open-source network security monitor trusted by the U.S. military, major banks, and critical infrastructure operators worldwide. After a 20-year career spanning Symantec, McAfee, Citrix, and Intel, Dye joined Corelight as CPO in 2018 and was elevated to CEO in August 2020. Under his leadership the company has grown 40% annually, expanded its cloud/SaaS business by 300%, secured a $150M Series E at a $900M valuation in April 2024, and positioned itself at the intersection of AI-driven automation and high-fidelity network evidence.
Ankur Singla is a three-time founder and serial entrepreneur who has built and exited companies totaling over $676 million in acquisitions. Currently Founder & CEO of Exaforce, an agentic AI-driven Security Operations platform based in San Jose, California, Singla is on a mission to give cybersecurity defenders a 10x productivity advantage. Before Exaforce, he founded Volterra (acquired by F5 Networks for $500M in 2021) and Contrail Systems (acquired by Juniper Networks for $176M in 2012 just nine months after founding). With a background spanning SDN, NFV, edge computing, and now agentic AI, Singla has consistently been at the frontier of enterprise infrastructure. Exaforce raised $75M in Series A funding in April 2025 and $125M in Series B in May 2026, reaching a $725M valuation.
David Sterling Erickson is the CEO and co-founder of Forward Networks, a Santa Clara-based company that pioneered the network digital twin. A Stanford PhD in Computer Science and one of the original architects of Software Defined Networking (SDN), Erickson co-founded Forward Networks in 2013 with three fellow Stanford PhD graduates to give enterprises mathematically accurate, real-time models of their networks - enabling visibility, compliance verification, and security posture management across complex multi-vendor environments. Under his leadership, Forward Networks has raised over $140M in funding, achieved 139% ARR growth, and serves marquee customers including Goldman Sachs, PayPal, and Telstra.