Upwind Security’s $250 million Series B round catapulting the company to a $1.5 billion valuation signals a decisive shift in how enterprises are approaching cloud and AI security. Led by Bessemer Venture Partners, with participation from Salesforce Ventures and Picture Capital, the raise comes as Upwind reports 900% year-on-year revenue growth and adoption by global enterprises such as Siemens, Peloton, Roku, and Nubank.
At the core of Upwind’s momentum is its inside-out, runtime-first security model. Unlike traditional cloud security tools that rely heavily on static scans or perimeter-based detection, Upwind focuses on real-time behaviour inside live environments. As modern cloud stacks grow more dynamic driven by containers, microservices, and AI workloads security threats increasingly emerge during runtime, not at deployment. Upwind’s approach directly addresses this gap.
Strategically, the timing is critical. Enterprises are rapidly deploying AI and agentic systems that operate autonomously, access sensitive data, and scale unpredictably. These workloads demand security systems that can observe, reason, and respond instantly, rather than rely on delayed alerts. Upwind’s growth suggests that buyers are prioritising operational visibility and actionable signals over bloated security dashboards.
CEO Amiram Shachar’s candid reflections on early uncertainty underline another important point: category creation is rarely linear. Convincing customers to adopt new security paradigms especially ones that challenge agent-based norms takes persistence. The payoff, however, is clear. As integration complexity and attack surfaces increase, solutions that reduce friction while increasing accuracy gain outsized advantage.
From an industry lens, this round reinforces a broader trend: runtime security is becoming foundational infrastructure, not an add-on. Capital is flowing toward platforms that can secure cloud-native and AI-driven systems at scale, in real time, and with minimal operational overhead.
Overall, Upwind’s rise highlights where cloud security is heading next continuous, intelligent, and deeply embedded into how modern software actually runs.
