Genesis

COVID-19 impacted us all globally: Vendors, customers, consumers and investors alike. We were sequestered in solitude, sheltered within the confines of our homes and simply could not connect with our colleagues and friends as we normally did. But, as it typically always does, duress sparks creativity. We started forming “COVID bubbles” online to share our stories, challenges, and innovation in cyber technology. And, we started to do so over a variety of our favorite libations, which mostly centered around wine! Our COVID bubbles began to grow organically through word of mouth, and whether this growth was inspired by our love for wine or our love for sharing our stories or both, the foundation of iCISO took roots in the summer of 2020.
 

The iCISO founding team decided to host a couple of curated (invitation-only) virtual wine-themed events to introduce emerging cyber security startups to CISOs who typically participated in our COVID bubbles. After the first couple of events, which drew significant kudos from the attendees for the quality of discussions (and tutelage on wine!) over germane topics that resonated with both CISOs and startups alike, we received referrals to other cyber startups and Venture Capital (VC) firms. Starting with the first event in the Fall of 2020, iCISO has now hosted more than two dozen virtual events nationally in every major metro region across the US and another two dozen events already planned until EOY 2021! 

Also central to the theme of connectivity was advisorship. The iCISO founders were already on Board and advisory positions at startups prior to these events, but the need for such executive and expert advisory contributions to both startups and VCs who partnered with the founders amplified considerably in the era of COVID. The founders (Dave, Fritz and Rajiv) are now advisors to more than a dozen outstanding cyber startups as a result and are at max capacity. As such, we decided to bring scale to the benefit of startups and VCs and expand the availability of these roles to our growing ecosystem of CISOs, many of whom were also keen to learn how to and invest in early-stage cyber startups. The genesis of iCISO was thus complete and its mission clear.