Monika Normand
- Linx counts Index Ventures, Cyberstarts, and Insight Partners among its backers.
- That is the same core group that funded Wiz, which just closed its $32 billion deal with Google.
- Wiz was about cloud security, while Linx is focused on identity security.
Linx Security has raised $50 million in Series B funding from many of the same early investors who helped turn Wiz into one of the biggest cybersecurity successes of the past decade.
The New York-based startup founded by Israel Duanis and Niv Goldenberg in 2023 counts Index Ventures, Cyberstarts, and Insight Partners among its backers, mirroring the core group that funded Wiz in its early days. Wiz's founders are also angel investors.
"My story with Wiz started 25 years ago when I slept in the same tent with Assaf Rappaport in the Army," Israel Duanis, CEO and co-founder of Linx, said in an interview, referring to the cofounder and CEO of Wiz.
Google recently closed its blockbuster $32 billion acquisition of Wiz, marking the largest deal in the company's history and one of the biggest ever in cybersecurity. The all-cash transaction, which took about a year to complete after facing regulatory scrutiny, underscores how critical cloud and AI security have become for large tech companies competing for enterprise customers.
Whereas Wiz was about cloud security, Linx is trying to provide the next generation of identity security.
"The market now is experiencing on the identity front what cloud was experiencing five to seven years ago," said Duanis.
Nearly 90% of security incidents now involve identity-related failures, according to a study from Palo Alto Networks.
Linx is trying to address that by continuously mapping every identity across an organization and taking action when something looks wrong.
"We understand there's a huge amount of attacks happening now on a daily basis, and it's only going to continue," Duanis said. "We will give you something to be proactive."
At the center of that approach is a product the company calls Autopilot, an autonomous agent that monitors identity activity and can remediate issues on its own.
"I liked the fact that it's really ready for the AI world," Teddie Wardi, a managing partner at Insight Partners, said in an interview. "Those were the things that got us excited that it's not just a Band-Aid. It's something that is a big, bold bet that will reinvent this industry."
Wardi said the surge of interest in companies like Linx reflects a bigger shift across cybersecurity.
Cybersecurity startups raised roughly $18 billion in 2025, up sharply from the prior year and marking one of the strongest funding years since the 2021 peak, according to Crunchbase data.
"Nowadays, it's the bad guy with the AI versus the good guy with the AI," Wardi said. "If you don't have AI-enabled solutions on the defender side, it's a really tough environment."
Linx is entering a crowded but aging market dominated by legacy identity governance players like SailPoint and Saviynt, which have long been the standard for large enterprises.
Duanis said those systems are struggling to keep up with the pace of change driven by AI.
"When you look at the companies that were founded 20 years ago, they had a mission to go and solve things more periodically," he said. "Now all of a sudden you need to make sure to do that in real time."