4 Tips for Mitigating the Risk of Working with Security Startups

Lior Div, CEO and Co-founder of Cybereason, was recently featured in Forbes, discussing 3 reasons companies should work with early stage security startups.

But working with startups is not risk-free. When an organization decides to be an early adopter of an emerging technology, there are always risks. However, one can mitigate these risks by focusing on solutions that:

1. Show Immediate Value In A Short-Term Proof Of Concept (PoC)

Testing the product in your own environment gives you the ability to evaluate its value in context of your organization’s business processes and operations.

2. Can Scale Up According To Your Needs

Working with an early stage company there is always a risk that the technology is still not mature enough to scale. To mitigate this risk,adopt a “Land and Expand” Strategy. Start with a small deployment and then incrementally expand to a broader environment.  Set clear milestones and success metrics with the vendor for each phase.

3. Require the Least Amount of Customization and Configuration

Time to value is an essential element in getting faster results. When working with a startup, look for solutions that can provide immediate value and do not add a significant management burden on your team. This should translate into “quick wins” where you can demonstrate the value of the product up the food chain.

4. Are Built to Integrate with Other Products

There is no single silver bullet for security, so companies that have a sense of where their products will fit within a larger eco-system and leverage APIs and other means to make it easy for their customers to maintain true “defense-in–depth.”