Belgian SaaS startup Aikido Security has raised €5 million in seed funding. The round was co-led by Notion Capital known for backing Upvest and MarketLeap, and Connect Ventures. It also saw participation from Inovia Capital Precede Fund I, led by partners Raif Jacobs and former Google CFO Patrick Pichette, and an impressive roster of angel investors, including Christina Cacioppo, CEO of Vanta.
The investment will be used to develop the functionality of the software, in particular ensuring that Aikido’s user experience and auto-triage is best in class. It will also focus on keeping the product simple, hiring staff across the product, development, marketing, and sales teams, and further growing the Aikido customer base, with a particular focus on solidifying and expanding its already strong foothold across Europe and North America.
Reduces false positives
Reported, the average cost of a data breach will reach $4.45 million in 2023. Aikido Security is on a mission to drastically improve security solutions for startup and growing SaaS companies. It was founded in 2022 in Ghent, Belgium by experienced entrepreneurs who have built successful products in various industries. The founding team consists of Willem Delbare (Teamleader, Officient), Roeland Delrue (Showpad, Officient), Amber Rucker (Veriff, Cloudbees) & Felix Garriau (nexxworks, AREA42).
It is on a mission to simplify SaaS security with its all-in-one tool that consolidates various application security features. Its unified approach enhances control and significantly cuts down on false positives. So far, the company has saved over 1,500 developer working days that would otherwise be spent on false positives.
Aikido Security is claimed to offer the fastest way for a growing SaaS company to secure its platform. The application delivers swift, customer-led onboarding with an instant view of all the critical vulnerabilities to be solved only a few minutes, lending users the time to focus on core business functions. It ranks vulnerabilities by severity, ensuring critical issues are addressed first. All security data stays within the platform, ensuring safety regardless of staff changes and aiding in business continuity.
CEO & CTO of Aikido, Willem Delbare stated, “In starting Aikido, I saw a better way to identify critical breaches whilst downgrading the distracting ‘non-issues’ that waste an engineer’s time. We are the only company in Europe doing this, demonstrating a renewed energy for startups in the continent. Our customers now include startups, as well as companies that have grown to over 300 developers – which has resulted in over 1000 total installs in just one year – a rarity in the world of new SaaS solutions. Looking forward, we want to out-do our competitors by offering a solution tailored to those who have yet to find a product that meets their needs.”
Kamil Mieczakowski, Partner at Notion Capital said, “As the pressure on small and mid-sized businesses mounts to demonstrate ever-increasing levels of cyber resilience, the landscape of security tools available to them continues to present challenges, characterised by fragmentation, complexity, and cost. Aikido provides a powerful yet easy-to-use end-to-end solution for code and cloud security, empowering any business to secure itself and its customers through a single tool capable of transforming every developer into a security expert. Despite being only one year old, the company is already scaling rapidly, and we’re thrilled to support them on this exciting trajectory alongside our friends at Connect Ventures and an incredible group of angel investors and advisors.”
Pietro Bezza, Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Connect Ventures noted, “In this new b2b software world, businesses seek SaaS products that combine efficacy with efficiency, value for money, simplicity and focus. We are in the era of the Great Bundle. Driven by the need for efficiency, customers are consolidating point solution software into full-stack software suites. Aikido all-in-one platform for software security fits extremely well with this new framework. We couldn’t be more thrilled to back Willem, Roeland and Felix in democratising access to the best security toolings for every company’s size and budget.”
