Security Startup Stories: The good, the bad, and the ugly of founding a cybersecurity business

Yeah. Yeah. I think the old joke was like, oh, yeah, someday we’ll work ourselves out of a job, but that’s not going to be.

Yeah, maybe someday, but not. Not anytime soon.

Not anytime soon. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Well, yeah, super excited to have you. And obviously, we’ve enjoyed, you know, just being partners in crime, you know, the last. For many years now, which is. Which has been fun. So. But, you know, so for today’s topic, you know, we were really excited about kind of just being able to share, I mean, call them war stories or startup stories or whatnot, but, like, we’ve both been on the side of the fence of either founding or co-founding a security company. Right. In a security startup and just a startup in general. And so we thought it’d be kind of fun to just kind of swap some stories, share kind of what some of our experiences have been for, just either for some fodder for people drinking coffee on a Friday or. Or just, you know, anybody that might be interested in, like, hey, I might want to dip my toe in the water, like, starting a company.

So, so that’s kind of like the stage for the topic that we’re going to be chatting about today, which I think obviously is near and dear both of our hearts. So. So, Ben, maybe kind of share a little bit about your founding story, you know, and, you know, kind of like how you got started, you know, and what, what prompted the idea to go ahead and, like, dive in? How did you come to that decision? You know, what. What was, what was going through the, through the thought process of, like, you know, because I think a lot of people that, that might have it have a bent towards entrepreneurship, you know, and diving into founding a company, you know, there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of aspects to that decision. Right. So I think, you know, I always love to, like, just know what was yours? How did you get there?

Yeah. Yeah, that’s a great question. You, you know, so for a long time, I was part of a managed service provider on the security team, ran the day-to-day security operations for a lot of customers, worked my way up, and was, you know, pretty high up in that program there. Really enjoyed it, but really found that there were some things I wanted to do that, you know, just kind of bumped your head up against, like, other things when it’s not your company. Right. And so I really enjoyed that experience, but sort of had a feeling that I would like to create my own at some point. I had no idea what format that would take.

I thought for sure that pen testing and doing consulting work would be a major part of it. But I also knew that there was a lot of, we built a lot of our own tools and did a lot of stuff like that. Not stuff that our customers use, but stuff that our team did. And I saw how effective that was. And so part of when I was at that organization, I had read some stuff about different startup incubators like y combinator and all these things about how you go create value in the world. And I was actually remembering one of your wh33lhouse newsletters. You talked about some of the Simon Sinek books.

Right. Start with why. And so it’s like, so that was a lot of it for me. And I remember vividly reading a passage. It might be a Paul Graham y combinator thing, which, I mean, that’s its own thing. I’m not saying that they’re 100% on all of this, but I remember they talked about, if you’re going to start your own business, you really need to have a, if you’re going to start, you need to have, like, the, either your co-founders or your first team. They have to be like, really incredible, like people you would describe as animals or whatever they do.

And so I was like, all right. So I was on the lookout for people who I would describe that way. So after I left that place, I was doing some freelance consulting and really kind of kicking around. And I got introduced by a mutual friend to my co-founder, Chris Friedman. And for those of you who don’t know Chris, Chris is an absolute force of nature and in a lot of ways, the exact opposite of me. Like the perfect yin to my yang. And so I was like, I think this could work.

So we started it, and then after not too much longer, we brought our other partner, now, Billy Stiggs. Anyway, so the three of us started it. But, you know, it’s one of those things, like, it sounds so great because you’re your own boss and you get to do this stuff. And what it really means is that there’s nobody else there to do the work. Like, if you’re not going to do it, that’s just it, right? Nobody’s. Nobody’s going to do it. And I think that was, that was really.
So that part of it for me was like taking that leap and, like, starting. And just when we started, we didn’t do anything. That was crazy overhead-wise. I mean, I think it was literally, we just sold consulting services and we just did it with our local, like our personal networks. So there was no marketing budget. There was none of that. It was just literally reaching out to people.
Like, hey, we’re doing this now. So, I mean, that was definitely our start. Yeah. How about you?

I mean, so you set out after doing a lot of different consulting work and a lot of fantastic work, and you’re like, I see this missing part, or is that how it started? Or does it start some other way for you?

Yeah, yeah, no, I think. I mean, I think so. Like, for one, I probably got the, I got the entrepreneurial bug kind of planted in me, I would say, at a young age. I was in high school. My dad, you know, he was a college professor. He had owned his own consulting practice in just software engineering back in the late seventies and early eighties. So he always kind of had some of that entrepreneurial spirit as well. That kind of probably always fed into me. I was a baseball player growing up. We didn’t have a ton of money, and so we actually started a company where we built batting cages. We sold batting cages online.

This was in the late nineties, like, this was before, like, e-commerce, right? We were kind of, like, I joked we were credit card numbers and stuff, right? So you could take the order, probably. We set up a website to sell batting cages online. So, like, people would order through our website and we’d ship them the batting cages. So that really kind of, like, you know, sparked a little bit of, like, enthusiasm into me around, like, you know, one, owning my own business, but just, like, having that kind of more sense of ownership around, like, my job, you know, so. But, like, so. But then I was always obviously very fascinated in math and computer science. I got a degree in computer science. I went to graduate school and got a master’s in computer security.

So I started my career, you know, and I just was really passionate about security. But I always kind of had this thing in the back of my head, like, man, I really would like to own my own business and or at least start a company in some fashion. So I kind of got to this point where it’s like, that was kind of what was eating at me more is like, I want to do something, and I hadn’t really, like, kind of spent time to kind of really sit down and figure out what that might be. So I kind of was just putting some pen to paper of, like, these are some pain points that I’ve had in my career thus far, right? And, you know, I think I kind of came to a realization. It’s probably.
Probably not going to ever have, like, this, like, world-changing idea, you know, you know, where it’s like, it’s just going to pop a light bulb and, you know, and then. And then that’s it. And I’ll just know. And I’ll just go, right, but I was like, but I want to start getting some experience and something to, like, be on the path to, like, you know, being, you know, starting a business and kind of going that route. So I was like, well, this is. This is a pain I have. Like, I hate.
I hate report writing. I hate the lack of collaboration, reporting, you know, and I hate coming back a year later and rewriting the same report, you know, specifically related. So I’m like, well, I’ll start. I mean, I can solve this problem. I’m a hacker and a coder. I have two degrees in computer science. So I can solve that problem. So I set out to just solve that problem, knowing, if anything, I’ll be the first user of it and maybe the only user of it. But at least I solved a problem for me and that’s kind of how I got started, is like, I started with the project more of a nights and weekends kind of bootstrapping it type thing, and then it just kind of continued to evolve.

So I always started it with the intent that it could be a business, but if not, then I would learn something along the way and maybe find something else. Right. And so that was how I got initially started. Taking the leap to actually dive in full-time was a little bit more of a mental calculus.

You know? Like, you know, I was, you know, we finally had. I had several customers, and it was kind of definitely starting to feel like it really is time to, like, either devote full time to this thing, you know, or not, you know, say, kind of a fisher bait. Even though I didn’t have, like, I wouldn’t say I had enough money coming in from just the software sales to really, you know, make ends meet, so to speak. But, you know, like, we, you know, we’ve kind of been preparing a little bit on the financial side. I always, like, my risk management calculus was maybe different than others in that, like, I still trust myself that, like, if this doesn’t work out, I can always go find another job.
Yeah, no, that’s important. So. So it’s like, you know, hey, why like you? We’re at a good spot. Let’s just do it.

And so dove in. Yeah. And it was just me. I didn’t have a co-founder, so I didn’t have many people to commiserate with, except my dog sitting at my feet. Yeah, that’s right. We’re very fortunate then, to, you know, get introduced to some great people, got. Got some initial investment, then hired some amazing, you know, people that were part of our early days and, you know, kind of how we. How we got rolling. So I think what’s interesting is, like, you know, we both have, like, similar, you know, kind of, like, thought processes around how we kind of approached starting a business. I went, you know, I kind of dove in, straight into the product side you started in the consulting and services side, and I think insecurity, I don’t know if there’s, like, another category that security companies get started in under. Right. They either. I mean, I think you’re right. I think it’s a service or product. Right.

I mean, it’s one of those two. And the path we took, starting with doing, like, security testing, consulting specifically, is great because there’s basically no overhead. Like, just somebody with a laptop is going to suddenly start. Go doing these things. And you have, when you sell the first gig, like, you know, the first pen test that you get, it’s like, okay, you do it and it’s like you take out your time and you’re like, oh, this is actually pretty profitable, right? So you go, we were really fortunate in that we had, like I said, a pretty good network. We could source some people who trusted us. Cause we were literally, you know, two and then three people, but with like, no background.

I did not understand how difficult it would be to get through most large organizations’ procurement groups with that setup. Right. I mean, you know, we had, we had nothing. We just incorporated. Our domain, I think was new enough when we sent emails. Sometimes it got quarantined to spam because it was still like less than 60 days old. Stuff like. Yeah, exactly.
We just stood it up. Who are these people? And so from that perspective, the services is a great entry point. On the other hand, it also is super crowded because the barrier to entry is pretty low. So if you know people and, you know, you can go sell that stuff, then I think that may be a good path to go. But to your point, I mean, you, if you’re going to get that customer to come back again, you have to demonstrate some level of proficiency and some valuable output that at the end of the day they’re like, yeah, that was worth having these knuckleheads do it for me versus other people that have been doing this for years. Right. And so I don’t know what the actual statistic is now, Dan. Maybe you do, but there’s something like, you know, some crazy percent of businesses fail in the first three years. Yeah, right. Like you really just got to figure that plan out. And I think it’s that. Right? I think you get in, you’ve got an idea, you sell a couple of things, and then it’s just like, you know, getting that pipeline built and getting, like, recurring work is tough. Right? Yeah. And I think that’s the hardest part of, like, getting your name out there, you know, showing you have value.

Right. In whatever it is, whether it’s a service or a product. Right, but you’re right. I think the barrier to entry on the services side is, is lower, but it’s in terms, in terms of cost. Right. Like, because it is your, it’s your brain power, it’s your, it’s your background and experience that you’re actually bringing to the table. You didn’t have to go build something first to then go sell it, which is kind of what I had to do.

Yeah, well, and, you know, the product side, on the services side, a lot of customers will have pen test already in the budget or some type of security consulting. So you don’t have to wait for a budget cycle. I can only imagine what it was like for you guys to get because you’re not in a category that people necessarily have to have and you probably have to wait for really long budget cycles to spin around.

Right. For sure. For sure. Especially so I think, you know, we sell to service providers, you know, consulting firms like yourselves and then, and then enterprise teams where, you know, so, so, you know, your, like, on defense procurement cycle was much quicker to get through than a larger customer.

Right. You know, that’s like an enterprise enterprise. They have like, you know, four levels of, you know, vendor security questionnaires and legal reviews and procurement a whole, you know, so, so those were things you kind of had to learn along the way of like, okay, especially when cash is king, you’ve got to really, like, make sure, okay, hey, this deal is going to happen, but we’re probably in a 60 to 90 day sales cycle just, just from, like, from the, like, procurement lifecycle, just from the time, like, we’ve already done all the selling the business, they, right, yeah, now they have to go and get it, you know, and so, yeah, we’re probably not getting cash in the bank for four to five months. Right. And so you’ve got to calculate, okay, like, you know, what does that impact for our bottom line? Right.

And that’s also, like, that’s also, you know, part of the reason why, you know, like, people do go for funding. And that’s part of the reason why we chose to go for funding, too, is that it helps, it helps ease that life cycle and it gives you the investment to grow. And I know that was kind of one of the things that we were going to chat about, too, was just like, you know, the different funding, funding paths that people have. Like, I get asked all the time, like, oh, should I raise money? Should I not raise money? And I think, I think, you know, my advice is always, it really depends on the business, you know, like, what, you know, what is the business?

What’s best for the business, you know, because, like, you guys have, you guys have built a solid consulting firm and now you’re also building a product. Right. So, and I think a lot of companies do that with. I’d love to hear your perspective on how that is going or has, you know, continues to go and, you know, yeah, because, you know, I think there’s a lot of people that, that have tried to build a product out of their services as well as, like, built services around their product. Right. So I’m curious to your perspective on that.

Yeah, yeah. I, so anecdotally, I think a lot of consulting firms believe they can build products, and I think probably most of them are wrong. You know, it’s one of those things, like, it’s not easy. I’m not even necessarily sure we do it totally the right way. So we are 100% bootstrapped. We don’t have any investors or, or anything else like that. One thing that, that has led us do, and I think this is probably the phase you guys were in before a lot of your, like, your series A and stuff kicked in. Right. Was, was you have the complete control of what the platform does. So you’re still, like, tinkering with it, playing around with it. And what’s beneficial is, like, it’s just you making the decisions, I think, in our opinion, and I don’t know that we’ll stay bootstrapped forever. I think the, you know, as we find these little, these valuable things that we’re getting signal from folks in the marketplace is like, that’s the thing I really want.I want to use that a lot. Then that is kind of like, helps us hone in on what does this exactly have to do for folks who don’t know? We build a product called Blind Spot that we sort of tripped and fell into building. Like, we didn’t set out to do it when we started OnDefend.

One of my goals, as I mentioned from my previous place, is we would build a lot of tools. We have our own development team in house. They don’t do work for other customers. They just do work for us. And most of the, what they do is, like, connect stuff together well, so we started doing a lot of, didn’t have a great name at the time, but purple teaming, I think, is pretty widely known to cover a lot of this, like, threat intel, you know, threat informed, specific testing where you’re looking at, like, improving the, the tuning of the tools and everything. We just had different aspects of it that were friction points for our team. Like, it just takes too long to run the activity. It takes too long to score. So we just started building these little, like, point solution tools that we then, like, went back and rewrote it as to, like, a contiguous app. And then we realized that that would probably be valuable for other folks, too.

It still kind of powers a lot of, like, we still deliver that as a service so customers get access to it. But it’s not just a standalone product, although people get that, too. But so anyways, in doing that, a lot of that was like, I don’t know, is this cool? Is this good information? Is this helpful? And so it was really great. Like, we got really good feedback from customers who need to do these things. And so I think the problem that we see most companies who take money and then fail, it’s because they didn’t really know what their product was going to do yet. And then they talk about these grand pivots later and, like, changes in course correction and even pivoting is fine, but the idea is, like, they hadn’t figured out the thing yet. That was, like, valuable. That was why somebody would start paying you money and keep paying you money. Right. And so because, you know, you don’t want to be figuring that out when you’re burning through your investment money. You want to be using that as, like, the rocket fuel that you’re going with. And so that’s kind of how we see it. Like, when we feel like we’ve got that thing on the launch pad and it’s like, finally, like, you know, standing straight up and ready to go to the moon, then that’s when we’ll, we’ll ignite that, that rocket. So, yeah, we certainly, we certainly talk to folks about it.

And, you know, you’re, when, you know, you guys did a lot of due diligence, I think, before you took any of that money. So you knew you had, like, a good group of investors that you trusted that would give you good advice and bring that up. So when you thought about doing that, was that a timeline in your head or was there like, a moment when you sat down, you looked at, like, the overall trajectory was there some metric that you were trying to hit that you’re like, okay, now it’s go time.

Yeah, no, it’s a great question. I mean, you know, because we’re now, you know, so basically we’re, we’re a series B funded company, right? Right. So we went seed, series A, and series B for those that may not be aware of how funding cycles work and everything. Right.
But so, so, like, you know, kind of coming back to, like, sometimes of, like, how else to say, like, hey, I think taking funding really depends on the business, right? It shouldn’t just be like, oh, we’re, we’re going to go take funding to start a company. It should, it should really be based on, like, what kind of business are you in? What kind of market are you in? You know, it’s. It’s not a one size fits all. And, like, I think that’s. That’s probably, like, you know, something that maybe people don’t. Don’t really think about, at least maybe,

I don’t know. But so, like, what I felt, you know, what I felt was important about PlexTrac is that, you know, when I. When I did dive in full time, I was like, at some point, I know we’ll probably need to take funding because it’s the type of product that really does need to grow quickly and get kind of first mover advantage, you know, into the market as opposed to something that could stay in stealth for a long time or anything like that. Right. You know, it’s. We weren’t that kind of a company. So, like, I did personally feel like what was best for the business would be to take funding to help accelerate growth as quickly as possible. Right. And accelerate, you know, the development. Right? Because it was just me, and I didn’t. I didn’t have additional revenue coming from other consulting services. Like, I did some side work just to kind of help pay bills.
But then what I was always struggling with is, like, anytime I’m spending a dollar or an hour on a consulting gig is an hour spent less on writing code. So when I dove in full time and I was just going to do kind of, like, split my time between consulting and development, software development, thinking, okay, at some point we’re gonna raise money.

But I didn’t. I distinctly did not have a, like, hey, I’m gonna go, you know, we need, like, we didn’t have, we weren’t in a mode of like, hey, I have to raise money now. Right? So I wasn’t, I didn’t have a plan as to when I’d raise money, but I did get introduced to a lot of folks, and that’s kind of what started to facilitate the conversation around, okay, like, maybe now is the time to take capital and just, like, poor fuel on the fire.

So that was really the calculus for the seed round. Right. And then with the seed round, it allowed us to start hiring some folks, develop more development, help resources, keep accelerating the roadmap and all the things that wanted to get into it and getting more customers. And then we grew through 2020. So our metrics were, we reached some certain milestones that really then started to unlock conversations around the series. And so that was kind of like, you know, that was kind of how that all kind of came together. But I think like, again, you know, if you, you know, it’s like if your product or your business is like more, more tenable for a, you know, for a bootstrapped or organic model, like, I mean, I, you know, some of the time it’s like, why wouldn’t you do that? Like, you know, there’s, that there’s not one size fits all for how you grow a business.

Right. And so for sure, that tends to be kind of like the conversation I have with folks that are really contemplating taking money or building. But I 100% agree with you in that there’s a lot of people that will take money before they really have any notion of how they’re going to commercialize something or if there’s actually a market for what they’re selling. And we were forced. We’d already commercialized. Right. We had people purchasing our products.
Right. So, I mean, that’s, that’s the best signal is when people are going to actually give you money for the thing that you are building because they found some value in it. Right. I mean, there’s so many cool ideas out there, but, but it’s hard to tell. Like, you know, there’s a lot of tools that, like, a customer might find valuable, but they may have a very specific circumstance that allows them to take whatever your thing does, your product does and then get it the rest of the way to done. Right. And so that’s what, that’s what I, that’s what we’re discovering is like, you know, there’s a certain market for just straight, you know, some of the work that we do, but without making some changes to it and, like being able to kind of like give it a finished product.

Right. Like a finished outcome, I guess it can be, it can be a tricky sell. And so everybody agrees it’s cool. Like when we go demo, it was like, oh, that’s awesome. But then when it comes time for, like, you know, and that’s kind of the things that we’ve been navigating, I think we’ve made a lot of progress there. And so that’s, that’s what I think. But, you know, for you, for your, for PlexTrac, what I loved about it when we saw it was like, it was obvious to us that this was going to save teams time, right, for how much we spent doing work and it was going to ramp up the quality because now we didn’t have to worry about, like, every time somebody did a finding for a well known vulnerability, we didn’t have to go through and make sure they were using, like, the correct up to date finding. Like, there was just so many pluses we saw of, like, saving time and money. Right. And so that was like, an easy win for when we evaluated PlexTrac. Right?

Yeah, yeah, well, we appreciate that. But, you know, like, but I think. I think that when you talk to, like, people that are looking at starting a company or founding a company, you know, really making sure that they, they’ve thought through all of those, like, objections. Like, what are the objections? Right.

And I think that, you know, I was a big fan of and still am, I just haven’t listened to it as much. But y combinator, you know, Paul, Paul Graham, Sam Altman, you know, those guys, they put out some just great resources. Right. You mentioned something about pivoting. Right. And I think Sam Ullman was the one who’s like, you know, we work with companies that’s like, you know, they talk about pivoting, but it’s like, it’s somewhere they actually were always wanting to go anyways with, you know, so, you know, a true hard pivot, like, you know, of a company is usually like a death sentence.

Right? Like, you know, it’s. It’s. Yes. It’s more like, hey, you always wanted to be in this direction. It’s just, you know, you’re kind of steering there sooner than you probably thought you were going to need to be. But if you have to be like, nope, this is completely different from what we were thinking we were going to do. That means you really didn’t have product market fit.
That probably means you were going to, you know, you’re going to be in a world of hurt. Right. And be one of those statistics. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. I mean, you know, and so, and I don’t mean to say that, like, you can’t ever change your direction because, of course, like what? Like, nobody knows what the future is going to be. Like, you’re going to run into some really great idea, to your point, that supports the mission of what you’re trying to do anyways, and, like, maybe that becomes the place that you really pivot to.

Right, right. Yeah. The other thing that I really like that they talk about, we actually went through a startup school with y Combinator, one of the remote versions, and we ended up bringing a product. Before we built Blind Spot, we had another thing that we thought was going to be valuable, turned out to not be. And so thank goodness we did that. But the experience was great. One of the things that we think a lot about, and you probably do too, is who is the buyer for the thing where it’s buying, where we’re trying to sell, right.

Because a lot of times it seems obvious until you go through the exercise of who is actually at the customer, who is our ideal customer, why do they need the thing and who is going to be the one making the decision? And then you have to go back to, does that person have any money? Because if the person who’s going to really, like your product doesn’t have any money now, they have to go convince other people with the money that your thing is cool, right. And that’s gonna be harder. And also, is there more than, like, a handful, if not just one buyer, right? Like, you know, how big is this? You know, that’s something we have to think a lot about, too, right? You know? Cause pen testing itself is a smaller market, right. You know, in terms of. So, like, hey, is this something that can be valuable and scalable? And I think those are important things to just, like, you to discern, too, when you’re talking about going and raising capital versus bootstrapping it, right. It’s like, you do have a lot more autonomy to spend time really fleshing that out when you’re not. When you haven’t taken money, right? Like, you know, like, In some respects, time is on your side a little bit more. But I think we all agree, like, time is money, right? Like, you got to go fast, period. Right? You know, you got to be an animal, right? You know, especially in those early, early days where, you know, it’s just you.

So let’s see. So, I know, I know we’re, you know, we’re already, you know, kind of getting close to time here, but one quick question for you. Like, you know, I. I have not experienced, you know, having a co founder, right? So I’m. I was a solo founder. And I think if I. If I were to go back and do this again, probably spend some time. I probably spend. I probably spend some time actually kind of identifying that co founder. Like, you know, I was very autonomous and, like, you know, because I had some exposure to, like, business as well as the tech side, I was just. I just naturally just did it all myself. But I think I would probably. If there’s, you know, people ask, hey, what would you do if it. You learn a lot along the way. There’s things you never would have known. So you can’t just play it. Play like, oh, I totally would have done this 100% differently, but I think there’s one thing I’d probably look for that co-founder, you know, for me, you know, probably, you know, I don’t have a co-founder ever, but, like, probably would have, like, gone the co-founder route. But I’m curious, like, you know, how, you know, how has that experience been for, like, you know, finding co-founders, you know, and then. And then kind of, you know, doing it together? What any. Would you do anything different?

I guess, yeah. Yeah, no. So I would definitely not have tried. I would definitely not go back and think I could do on to been by myself. There is zero doubt about that. The thing here was a team effort, and it took. Took that team that we had in place the whole time. There’s no doubt about that. You know, one of the great things about having a co-founder is that, especially in the relationship that Chris and I have, wherever Chris doesn’t do, like, when we first got together and we hung out the shingle and we were doing pen testing, like, that was not Chris. But what Chris did, what was great was he would write up all, like, the, you know, the proposals. He would go out and, like, you know, beat the streets looking for work. He would go, you know, do all these things. So while I was down, heads down, like, doing the pen test, he was out selling the next one, which is great, because a lot of folks who do, like, initial, like, solo consulting. That’s the problem. You just mentioned it about, like, the side gig, taking away from product time. Well, if you’re. If you yourself are the product and you’re ahead, you get a gig and you’re like, great. I get to do this work. As soon as you’re, like, done with that project, you better have another one lined up. And this, you’re gonna have to charge a lot for those projects to make it right. And so that.

That was really good. And also, it was really helpful because a lot of times, I would come up with something that made sense to me that, like, I’m like, oh, that’s a super valuable outcome.
And then I would have to explain it to Chris and be like, why would I care about this? Right? Because. And Chris comes at it much more from, like, the way that non-CISOs come at it, which is really helpful to have that person in your camp, if you can explain this to me outside of security, like, why I would spend all this money on that. And that can be. Then you realize, like, oh, yeah, no, I guess I got to rethink that. Right? So that’s been really helpful to put that thing down. Now, that’s not to say that Chris and I don’t occasionally butt heads any type of creative process like this where you’re kind of under the stress, but it’s been really great. I can only imagine, like, as a solo founder, because there are some days, like, you’ll have, like, a call with a customer or something like that.

You just. You both kind of have to, like, take a breath for a second. Like, go step outside and, like, okay, what are we gonna do about this? Right? And it’s very helpful to have people, you know, to talk to you about those things. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And frankly, that was what took me as long as it did to start OnDefend. I knew I wasn’t gonna do it by myself. I wanted to find somebody that I thought could do, you know, could help, you know, put that together. So it was after I met Chris that I realized that, like, I think this. I think this could actually happen now, which was. I remember vividly that very exciting day. Like, I was, like, up running on the treadmill of the gym that morning. I was, like, elated. Like, I. This can actually happen now. It was really. Yeah, it’s really amazing. Yeah, that’s cool. That’s cool. Yeah. And, I mean, I. You know, I’ve been fortunate.

I mean, I won’t say, like, you know, while I didn’t have a co-founder, I’ve been super fortunate to have some really solid people that joined earlier. You know, you could bounce a lot of. You could. You could share a lot of that load. But there is a difference, I think. You know, I definitely know there’s a difference. There’s certain things. It’s like, hey, at the end of the day there, they’re not, like, you know, they’re not a founder. Right. And so, like, they’re there. Yes. They’re gonna have a little bit different mentality. So, you know, I had to bear some of that myself, you know? But. But I think that, you know, a lot of people ask me that question and stuff, and so could I do it again by myself? Probably, because I did it once, but, like, you know, I would definitely recommend, like, my recommendation. So much work, but so, yeah, so.

Well, I. Gosh, we’re. You know, we knew we would. We knew we’d shoot the breeze for a lot longer than we thought we would. And this is. This needs to be, like, a four-day workshop.
You know what I mean? We can. We could fill days with stuff.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

So, well, maybe we’ll do a part two or something in a bit, or do a webinar or something. But, but thanks so much for taking some time. Tell us, like, anything that, you know, what can we promote about you? Where can we find you? Yeah, so we’re really active on, especially LinkedIn, but I mean, all the socials. But if you follow us on LinkedIn, we’ve got some new series going on, some sort of, like, behind the scenes with some CISO customers of ours, some real challenges they face and some things that go.

And so it’s not all just like marketing about us. I mean, there’s a fair amount of that, but a lot of, like, challenges that folks are solving in kind of, like, new and exciting ways. And we have some, some cool things coming out, both for blind spot and just on defend in general. So if you follow us there, you can sign up for our little newsletter. We don’t, we don’t send it that often. It’s always full of good stuff like we do and. Yeah.

So I really appreciate it. It was a lot of fun. Yeah, yeah. No, thank you. And I will tell, you know, anybody, you know, that will listen, they work with these guys. There’s top notch, quality work and just great people, you know, I always enjoy, you know, the people that we get to meet along the way in our journey. And you guys are at the top of the list in terms of people that I just really enjoyed just meeting and getting to know and becoming friends with.

And so thanks for joining friends Friday and, you know, so you know how to get in touch with Ben and on defend and the team there. As always, you know how to get in touch with PlexTrac. If you have any questions or any thoughts, leave them in the comments and we’ll get back to you and chat and, but again, thanks, thanks for joining. Happy Friday and enjoy the rest of your weekend.