“Now I can go out and talk about cyber without fear.” That was entrepreneur Jude Osamor’s assessment of what our Cyber Runway accelerator did for him.
We’re extremely proud of the 107 members that have just graduated from Cyber Runway. From entrepreneurs like Jude who have found the confidence to launch a cyber startup to companies like Meterian and Jitsuin, which met during the programme and integrated their technologies, members have made the most of the last nine months.
Funded by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, Plexal delivered workshops, events and mentoring with support from CyLon, the Centre for Secure Information Technologies (CSIT) and Deloitte.
Bringing together cyber innovators from across the UK, our curriculum focused on everything you need to know about building a startup, from pitching to investors for the first time to recruiting talent as you scale. We also wanted to help members build better businesses, so we had sessions on mental health, creating an inclusive culture and designing policies that make startups more environmentally sustainable.
We’re also proud that 46% of all member companies were female-led, 52% were BAME-led and 50% of participants were based outside South East England.
Read some of the highlights below and sign up to our cyber newsletter to be the first to hear about our next intake.
Launch: for entrepreneurs at the start of their journey
Members got to grips with everything from validating their idea to setting themselves apart, and 86% told us they had made useful connections during the programme.
Member spotlight:
Ahmed Shosha is a Senior Security Software Engineer at Microsoft and is working on an idea for a mobile security platform with Ahmed Zaki, former Senior Security Engineer at Facebook. They used the accelerator to shape their value proposition and decided to focus on the gaming sector. They’re now building a minimum viable product and are already having early conversations with potential customers.
Elsewhere, Aliyu Yisa brought on co-founder Ralitsa Demitrova during the programme. Together they’ve been developing their startup idea and have decided to focus on easily embeddable, scenario-based security awareness.
“It’s been an incredible experience. I feel a lot more confident and capable to take my startup further. I hope this programme continues and I look forward to applying to the Grow stream next time!” – Aliyu Yisa, Launch stream member
Grow: for startups and SMEs that are gearing up for growth
We helped 67 companies with everything from commercialisation to achieving a closer product-market fit. Companies in this stream saw a 20% increase in revenue, an 8% increase in investment and a 22% increase in headcount over the course of the programme.
Member spotlight:
Grow members Meterian and Jitsuin spotted a collaboration opportunity during a Cyber Runway session. They then integrated their products to make it possible for software publishers to automate the creation, storage, retrieval, publishing and distribution of Software Bill of Materials (SBOM) with full governance.
“Meterian automatically creates SBOM as part of routine vulnerability scanning in software development while Jitsuin has the bill of materials distribution system. What we’ve built is a connection between the two tools. Developers can automate themselves out of the process to share SBOM.” – Vivian Dufour, CEO, Meterian
Scale: ramping up for startups that are ready to scale
20 companies got highly tailored support, including mentoring and founders-only sessions, to help them achieve later-stage investment, expand overseas, build their client base and prepare for rapid growth.
Member spotlight:
CyberHive has taken advantage of being part of the programme to get CSIT’s engineering team to review the minimum viable product version of a solution that uses quantum technology and algorithms to provide secure tunnelling.
CyberHive also connected with several other Scale members: it’s speaking to Secure Impact about joint marketing activity, has worked with CAPSLOCK on recruitment and the startup is exploring joint opportunities with Ioetec, Majenta, Licel, Swidch and Bob’s Business.
Meanwhile, Messagenius found partners to team up with for joint opportunities. They told us: “We found a hub of professional mentors and partners in the Cyber Runway programme. Thanks to a wide range of workshops and one-to-one sessions with experts, we were able to exchange experiences and get useful insights on the common challenges and trends in our sector. We’re proud to be part of the Cyber Runway community, which has accelerated our progress.”
