Exclusive: Kevin Mandia joins cyber startup Expel's board
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Ex-Mandiant CEO Kevin Mandia during a keynote at the RSA Conference in 2023. Photo: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Cybersecurity powerhouse Kevin Mandia is joining the board of managed security startup Expel, the company first tells Axios.
Why it matters: Mandia's company, called Mandiant, is now owned by Google.
- Mandia's support can help Expel stand out in the crowded cybersecurity startup market.
Zoom in: Mandia, who is also a general partner at Ballistic Ventures, is joining Expel's board as an independent director.
- Founded in 2016, Expel provides managed cybersecurity services to a range of companies, including in the aviation, entertainment, legal, healthcare and consumer brand markets.
- The company has roughly 450 employees and reached $100 million in annual recurring revenue last year, and Expel CEO David Merkel told Axios he tapped Mandia to come aboard to help them bring that metric to $500M.
The big picture: Expel is up against an increasingly competitive market.
- Several startups and large cyber vendors are in the managed security space, which basically provides an outsourced cyber team that companies can rely on to monitor their security tools and threat alerts.
- Competitors include major players like SentinelOne and Sophos.
Between the lines: This competition is precisely why Merkel asked Mandia, a long-time friend of his, to join the board.
- Expel has "performed extremely well" with early adopters, or companies that have the resources to invest in advanced cybersecurity rather than the bare basics, Merkel said.
- "But not every company can be an early adopter, that's not their business and that's not their model," he said. "We need to meet them where they are and make sure we're relevant to their problems."
Flashback: Mandia and Merkel have known each other for roughly 30 years and first met back when they were in the Air Force.
- Mandia also brought on Merkel to help build out Mandiant's managed cybersecurity service offering.
The intrigue: Customer satisfaction and referrals are how the best cybersecurity companies will survive, Mandia told Axios.
- "For security aware buyers, best of breed probably wins a lot [of the time]," he said.
What's next: Merkel is keeping all options for the company, including the possibility of going public, on the table.
