Why we’re so excited about making it onto the TechCrunch List

YL Ventures has been added to ‘The TechCrunch List’! This tremendous honor is made even more special to us by the fact that this curated list is a compilation of founder-nominated VCs and that we are joining as the first Israel-focused VC in its cybersecurity category.

The TechCrunch List is a very important resource to aspiring entrepreneurs looking to “cut through the noise of the VC industry” and find “investors that can catalyze their rounds.” It highlights investors with a dedicated commitment to carrying out first-round due-diligencing and particularly favors seed-stage investors.

Interestingly enough, the lists’ FAQ outlining TechCrunch’s selection criteria represents a great deal of what YL Ventures is all about. For example, the selection process is inherently biased towards recent & first/lead investors, referring to TechCrunch’s interest in investments that have been made recently, ideally at the seed stage, given how this is often the most difficult and research-intensive phase of entrepreneurship. The list also celebrates investors that embody support from seed through growth, once again referring to the list’s preference of early or lead investors as well as those with a dedicated focus towards growth rather than exit. Finally, the list is organized by market vertical, given that it highlights focused investors with specific areas of expertise.

Over the last several years, the YL Ventures team has worked diligently towards a multi-tiered strategy to achieve one goal: help Israeli cybersecurity entrepreneurs build amazing companies. This has led us to spend the better part of the last decade refining our focus and expertise in cybersecurity, building up our professional network to include thousands of cybersecurity luminaries that provide critical market insights, and making a meaningful impact on Israel’s cybersecurity ecosystem with a consistent and valuable presence. Throughout this time, we have come to appreciate how important the role of a seed investor can be, and have earnestly sought more ways to add value in every interaction we have with entrepreneurs—even pre-investment.

This drive has shaped our core-identity, and we now proudly operate as a value-add focused seed investor with an exclusive interest in Israeli cybersecurity solutions. This has come to guide our every move. Consequently, our team has grown substantially to feature a wide-array of multidisciplinary talent, from business developers and marketing specialists, to business analysts and human resources, to support our portfolio founders from seed to lead as well as entrepreneurs in their ideation phase via our due-diligence process. Most recently, this expansion has included our very own CISO-in-Residence to provide founders with a reliable, go-to source for customer perspectives and product-market fit, and a new CTO to work with entrepreneurs on ideation pre-investment and technological refinement.

We have moreover established and expanded our board of Venture Advisors to include over 90 global cybersecurity executives from Fortune 100 and high-growth companies. Their expertise and experience enriches entrepreneurs’ market validation before investment and guides our portfolio companies’ product development, product-market fit and go-to-market strategies. Our Venture Advisors play an additionally important role as survey participants in our data-driven CISO Current reports, a quarterly initiative to loop cybersecurity entrepreneurs into the specific needs and buying patterns of their target customers.

This high-involvement strategy has allowed us to develop extraordinary relationships with Israeli cybersecurity founders. It has also come to lie at the very heart of our investment strategy. Our early, hands-on, involvement in supporting disruptive cybersecurity solutions encourages us to invest in teams above all else. We view our ties as partnerships and weigh our potential bonds with the entrepreneurs that come our way as a fundamental component of our due diligence process. This is why we are particularly touched to learn that our incredible portfolio companies decided to nominate us to this list.

It is our mission to continue supporting the powerful potential of Israeli cybersecurity entrepreneurs by giving them the initial boost they need and expertise thereafter to make their mark on the industry. Last year, we raised a fourth fund that brought our assets under management to $270M. Empowered by how well the cybersecurity industry continues to perform despite the global climate, we are committed to continuing to put both those funds and the rest of our resources to work towards incredible teams. So, if you’re a cybersecurity entrepreneur ideating the next great cybersecurity disruptor, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. We’re very excited to meet you!