“Revolutionizing Security Tools with Simbian’s AI Integration”

Ambuj Kumar, a man driven by his ambitious nature, has ventured into multiple industries throughout his career.

With a background in electrical engineering, Kumar spent eight years leading hardware design at Nvidia, a company renowned for its technological advancements, such as a high-speed memory controller for GPUs. In 2010, he decided to pivot into the cybersecurity field and co-founded Fortanix, a cloud data security platform.

During his time at Fortanix, Kumar observed the challenges faced by the cybersecurity industry and the pressure put on security leaders. He noted, “Security leaders are stressed… CISOs don’t last more than a couple of years on average, and security analysts have some of the highest churn rates. And things are only getting worse.”

Inspired by these challenges, Kumar and former Twitter software engineer Alankrit Chona co-founded their next venture, Simbian. This platform utilizes AI technology to automate a company’s cybersecurity workflows, effectively controlling other cybersecurity platforms, security apps, and tools. By leveraging AI, Simbian can automatically orchestrate and operate existing security tools, taking into consideration a company’s priorities and security thresholds based on their unique business requirements.

Through Simbian’s chatbot-like interface, users can simply type their cybersecurity goals in natural language and receive personalized recommendations. Kumar describes these as “automated actions” that the platform can execute to the best of its ability.

According to Kumar, the cybersecurity industry is highly fragmented, with security companies focusing on improving their own products, resulting in a higher operational burden for organizations. This is evident in the fact that many businesses have an oversupply of security tools, with over half feeling that they’ve misallocated around 50% of their budgets and still can’t mitigate threats, according to Forbes. Another study found that on average, organizations manage 76 different security tools, causing IT teams and leaders to feel overwhelmed.

Kumar recognizes that the constantly evolving landscape of IT growth only adds to these challenges, with the attack surface continuously increasing. He notes the shortage of cyber experts, stating that a recent survey estimates a shortfall of 3.5 million people by 2025.

In addition to configuring a company’s security tools, Simbian also responds to “security events,” allowing customers to steer security while taking care of lower-level details. This can significantly reduce the number of alerts security analysts have to handle.

However, with AI technology, there is always a risk of errors. To prevent this, Simbian’s AI was trained using a crowdsourcing approach, including a game on its website called “Are you smarter than an LLM?” This game challenged volunteers to “trick” the AI into doing the wrong thing, and the platform then used this information alongside in-house researchers to ensure it performs appropriately in real-life situations.

Kumar explains that the company effectively outsourced some of its AI training to gamers, although it’s unclear how many people actually played the game.

There are understandable concerns regarding privacy with a system controlling multiple systems, especially in highly sensitive areas such as security. Kumar addresses this by assuring that every effort has been made to safeguard against data compromise. Simbian implements encryption, with customers controlling the encryption keys, and they have the ability to delete their data at any time. Kumar emphasizes that “as a customer, you have full control.”

While Simbian is not the only platform attempting to apply AI technology over existing security tools, it has already caught the attention of investors. The company recently raised $10 million from investors such as Coinbase board member Gokul Rajaram, Cota Capital partner Aditya Singh, Icon Ventures, Firebolt, and Rain Capital.

Rajaram praises Simbian’s approach to solving such a critical issue in our time, stating, “I applaud Simbian’s method of building an integrated platform that would understand and operate all of security.” As for putting his money where his mouth is, Rajaram has invested in the company, along with others. He explains, “It’s the team with unique experience all the way from hardware to cloud.”

Based in Mountain View, Simbian currently has 15 employees and plans to allocate most of the capital raised towards product development. With Kumar at the helm, the startup aims to double its workforce by the end of the year.