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JOURNEY · DETAIL
Wiz: Four Military Best Friends Left Microsoft, Reached $32B in 5 Years, and Were Swallowed by Google as a Cloud Security Unicorn
Founded: Assaf Rappaport (CEO), Ami Luttwak (CTO), Roy Reznik (VP of Engineering), Yinon Costica (VP of Product) -- Four close friends from their military days in Israel, who previously co-founded Adallom and joined Microsoft together · Wiz, Inc. (Israeli-American cloud security company, integrated into Google Cloud starting March 2026)
JOURNEY
Key Fields
FIELD STAMPSIndustrySaaS / Enterprise Software
RegionMulti-region
ScaleGiant
ChannelOther
Origin
Rappaport enlisted in 2001, entering the elite Talpiot project and Unit 81 tactical intelligence unit in the Israel Defense Forces, later rising to Captain in Unit 8200 (the Israeli NSA equivalent). In the military, he met Roy Reznik, Ami Luttwak, and Yinon Costica -- the four would later become lifelong entrepreneurial partners. In 2012, they teamed up for the first time to co-found Adallom, focusing on SaaS data security, which was acquired by Microsoft three years later for approximately $320 million. During their 5 years at Microsoft, they built the Azure security stack and learned a level of discipline they never had during the Adallom era: accepting every customer request blindly piles up massive technical debt. At Microsoft, they famously cut 75% of features inherited from Adallom to achieve scalability. In January 2020, the four decided to leave Microsoft to build a 'Switzerland-style' neutral security scanning platform supporting AWS, Azure, and GCP -- a neutral product that Adallom never built and Microsoft could not produce internally.
Milestones
2012
First Team-Up PMF
After retiring from the military, the four teamed up for their first joint venture, founding Adallom as a Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) to protect SaaS application data. At the time, they believed in 'saying yes to every customer request,' rapidly accumulating features along with technical debt. In July 2015, Microsoft acquired Adallom for about $320 million, bringing all four into Microsoft. This modest exit provided the ammunition for their second venture: the team stayed intact, learned big-tech execution strategies together, and gained an internal perspective on enterprise-grade scalability. This phase lasted from 2012 to 2015.
2015
Learning Discipline at Microsoft Turning Point
At age 34, Rappaport was appointed head of Microsoft's Israel R&D Center, managing about 1,500 people and leading the Cloud Security Business Unit. Over those 5 years, the four shifted from 'saying yes to everything' to 'never sacrificing scalability for short-term customers,' personally stripping 75% of features from the Adallom legacy. Luttwak later summarized: 'Engineers don't have to listen to Product -- give customers what they want, but if it doesn't scale, don't build it.' This was the foundational genetic code that allowed Wiz's product to scale to $100M ARR in 18 months. This phase lasted from 2015 to 2019.
2020
Directional Pivot & Trial-and-Error Failure
In January 2020, the four left Microsoft, initially naming the company Beyond Networks and positioning it as cloud network security. A few weeks later, they realized the focus was too narrow: CISO interviews repeatedly revealed that the true pain point wasn't the network layer, but rather that multiple tools across multi-cloud environments left non-security experts unable to see the full picture. They decisively changed direction and renamed the company Wiz ('the more general, the better, just in case we pivot again and the IRS doesn't get too upset'), moving up from the network layer to multi-cloud risk scanning. This was the most critical sacrifice in Wiz's entrepreneurial history, and its most painful initial self-negation.
2021
Navigating the Pandemic Turning Point
In 2021, as the pandemic broke out and the global economy stalled, the team started entirely remotely. Rappaport later admitted that for the first few months, he kept questioning whether he should have left Microsoft, and family members were urging them to quit. However, the pandemic acted as a reverse tailwind: global CISOs paused all on-premises projects and pivoted fully to the cloud. Wiz's remote-first product, ready on day one, actually moved faster than centralized office setups. Rappaport noted: 'If you made me pick any point in history to start a cloud security company, I would pick March 2020.'
2021
Rising Through Vulnerability Disclosures Growth
Wiz's research team continuously disclosed high-impact cloud vulnerabilities: ChaosDB (Azure Cosmos DB flaw allowing remote data download/deletion, affecting thousands of Azure customers), OMIGOD (unauthorized remote code execution via embedded OMI agent in Azure services), NotLegit (Azure App Service source code exposure), ExtraReplica (Azure PostgreSQL privilege escalation for cross-database access), AttachMe (Oracle Cloud volume isolation failure), BingBang (Azure AD misconfigurations allowing Bing search result modification to steal Office 365 credentials), and the 2025 disclosure of DeepSeek's sensitive database exposed to the public internet. Each disclosure challenged cloud providers while cementing Wiz onto the industry agenda -- research as marketing became Wiz's cheapest yet most valuable protective moat. This phase lasted from 2021 to 2024.
2022
Hitting $100M ARR PMF
In December 2020, coming out of stealth, Wiz closed a $100 million Series A round (backed by Index, Sequoia, Insight, and Cyberstarts). In August 2022, Wiz announced its ARR grew from approximately $1M in February 2021 to $100M -- taking just 18 months, making it the fastest-growing software company in history to reach $100M ARR. Nine months later, ARR doubled again to $200M. 45% of the Fortune 100 became customers. Agentless cross-cloud scanning was the core technical differentiator: providing a comprehensive view of risk combinations across AWS, Azure, GCP, OCI, and Kubernetes without installing agents.
2024
Collapsed Due Diligence Failure
In April 2024, Wiz completed the acquisition of cloud detection and response startup Gem Security for roughly $350 million, immediately followed by rumors of acquiring another cloud security company, Lacework. However, as due diligence entered May, the deal collapsed. Lacework was eventually sold to Fortra. This was Wiz's first public stumble during its high-speed M&A expansion -- 'you can't swallow everything you want to eat' -- laying the groundwork for more disciplined future acquisitions.
2024
Rejecting $23B Offer Inflection Point
In March 2024, Google CEO Sundar Pichai emailed Rappaport expressing acquisition interest, but Rappaport was so busy he completely missed it, only being reminded months later after a security conference to 'check his inbox.' In May, Rappaport and Costica visited the Googleplex to meet Pichai and Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian, after which Google tabled a $23 billion offer -- about double their valuation at the time. The team ran the numbers with advisors like Goldman Sachs, and in late July, Rappaport decided to decline, pushing forward with an IPO. At the time, critics called it 'divergent visions' and 'letting a once-in-a-decade deal slip away,' but history proved this to be the highest-return rejection ever.
2025
Google's $32B Sweetened Bid Turning Point
As the IPO market cooled and the new Trump administration proved more favorable to M&A, Google returned to the negotiating table. On March 18, 2025, Google announced the acquisition of Wiz for $32 billion in all cash, plus a $3.5 billion reverse termination fee -- paid by Google even if regulators blocked the deal. This ranked among the top ten tech acquisitions in history, the largest cybersecurity acquisition ever, and Google's most expensive M&A in its 130-year history. Rappaport remarked: 'Because we already knew the team and culture from the previous round, saying yes was much more natural.'
2026
Integration into Google Growth
On February 10, 2026, the European Union antitrust authorities unconditionally approved the acquisition, clearing the final major regulatory hurdle. On March 11, 2026, the acquisition officially closed, integrating Wiz's roughly 2,000 employees into Google Cloud while maintaining relatively independent operations for the team. Wiz's founders are each expected to cash out over $3 billion, bringing the largest M&A case in Israeli tech history to a close.
Turning Points
- Beyond Networks was too narrow; the four used CISO interviews to decisively abandon the network layer, pivot to multi-cloud risk scanning, and rename to Wiz -- the most crucial sacrifice in entrepreneurial history.
- Spending 5 years at Microsoft transforming the 'yes-to-all' Adallom discipline into 'never sacrifice scalability for short-term gains,' laying the product foundation for Wiz to hit $100M ARR in 18 months.
- Rappaport missing Pichai's emails for months before meeting actually drove the initial $23B and subsequent $32B offers -- 'missing meetings and ignoring emails' became Wiz's ultimate lucky charm.
- Rejecting Google's $23B offer in July 2024 to pursue an IPO, only for Google to sweeten the bid to $32B all-cash with a $3.5B breakup fee 9 months later.
- Starting entirely remote due to the pandemic outbreak, perfectly catching the tailwind of CISOs pausing on-premises projects and migrating fully to the cloud.
Failures & Pitfalls
- Beyond Networks was initially positioned for cloud network security, but within weeks proved too narrow, forcing a self-rejection, pivot, and renaming in its second month.
- The Lacework acquisition talks collapsed during due diligence in May 2024, marking Wiz's first public stumble in its rapid M&A expansion.
- During Wiz's first few months, Rappaport constantly regretted leaving Microsoft, team members' families urged them to quit, and they nearly disbanded before the company took off.
- Cycling through 3 CMOs in 3 years, including a veteran CMO from Okta who departed after only 9 months, reflecting governance tensions in an ultra-high-growth team.
- Rappaport missed Sundar Pichai's acquisition interest email for months; if a third party hadn't reminded him between meetings, they would have completely missed the negotiation window.
关键成功要素
- Four military best friends collaborating across three long-term ventures (Unit 8200 -> Adallom -> Microsoft -> Wiz); team chemistry and shared combat experience matter more than any individual resume.
- Agentless cross-cloud scanning technology: providing visibility into risk combinations across AWS, Azure, GCP, OCI, and Kubernetes without installing agents, locking in top Fortune 100 enterprise clients.
- Research as marketing: Wiz's research team continuously disclosed high-impact cloud vulnerabilities like ChaosDB, OMIGOD, BingBang, and the DeepSeek exposure, turning each disclosure into industry agenda-setting and customer trust assets.
- Scalability discipline learned over 5 years at Microsoft: 'Engineers don't need to listen to product,' giving customers what they want only if it scales.
- Multi-cloud neutral 'Switzerland' positioning: treating AWS, Azure, GCP, and OCI equally to avoid being locked into any single cloud provider.
- Targeting top Fortune 100 enterprise clients from day one to win massive contracts rather than bottom-up struggles with SMBs.
- The courage to say no to a $2.3 billion offer in July 2024 -- the team had strong conviction that their commercial fundamentals were accelerating and dared to sacrifice short-term maximums for greater momentum.
Lessons
- The scalability discipline learned from a second venture is far more valuable than the 'saying yes to everything' approach of a first venture -- cutting 75% of Adallom's features became the underlying genetic code for Wiz's rapid ARR growth.
- Missing a CEO's email or a meeting doesn't mean losing a customer; it can actually act as white space for a higher-priced offer later -- Rappaport himself noted, 'Most of my biggest opportunities start with me missing a meeting.'
- Rejecting the largest software acquisition offer in history while commercial fundamentals accelerate can convert a discounted price into a higher valuation -- soaring from $23B to $32B in just 9 months.
- Research as marketing is cloud security's cheapest yet most expensive moat: gaining industry mindshare without burning cash, though it requires a continuous supply of top-tier research talent.
- Team bloodline and long-term collaboration tenure outweigh a single individual's resume; the Unit 8200 partner-centric model was the single critical variable in Wiz growing into a $30B company in 5 years.
- Not every company can capitalize on a pandemic tailwind -- a product format that is fully remote and cross-border from day one naturally filters for the genetic traits required to accelerate in such conditions.
Core Data
- August 2022 Annual Recurring Revenue：$100 million (Fastest software company in history to reach $100M ARR, achieved in 18 months) (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- 2023 Annual Recurring Revenue：$350 million (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- 2024 Annual Recurring Revenue：Approx. $500 million (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- Fortune 100 Customer Share：45% (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- In the History of Israeli Tech M&A：Largest tech acquisition involving an Israeli startup (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- Valuation Timeline：October 2021: $6B -> February 2023: $10B -> May 2024: $12B -> March 2025: Acquired by Google for $32B (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- Employee Headcount (2025)：Approx. 2,000 employees (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- Acquisition Consideration：$32 billion all-cash, plus a $3.5 billion reverse termination fee (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
- Total Funding Raised：Approx. $1.9 billion (Company disclosed figures as of 2026, unverified by independent review)
Competitors / Peers
Direct competitors to Wiz in the cloud security space include CrowdStrike, Palo Alto Networks (Prisma Cloud), Orca Security, Lacework (later sold to Fortra), Check Point, and Zscaler. Among them, Orca Security and Lacework are the most direct competitors with the most similar paths, also performing agentless cloud security scanning. Palo Alto Networks exerts platform-level pressure through its Prisma Cloud security portfolio and threat intelligence network. After joining Google Cloud, Wiz continues to serve AWS and Azure customers to maintain its multi-cloud neutrality commitment, while serving as Google Cloud's trump card against the security ecosystems of AWS and Azure -- presenting both a defensive moat and a risk of conflict of interest.
Sources
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiz_(company)
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assaf_Rappaport
- https://fortune.com/article/wiz-cloud-security-ceo-assaf-rappaport-google-sundar-pichai/
- https://www.indexventures.com/perspectives/cloud-captains-how-assaf-rappaport-and-his-extraordinary-co-founders-built-the-worlds-fastest-growing-company/
- https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexkonrad/2023/08/08/nobody-beats-wiz-meet-the-aggressive-10-billion-startup-shaking-up-cloud-security/