It’s an exciting time at SafeGuard Cyber. In the past nine months we have secured a Series B round of funding, hired Rusty Carter our Chief Product Officer, secured a new patent in Social Engineering and launched new security features that have been designed to keep pace with the exponential growth of digital communion channels that today’s cloud-first workforce needs to get their job done from anywhere.
Nothing is more exciting for a company than to bring in brand new, world class talent. Which is why we were recently delighted to announce the appointment of industry veteran Chris Lehman as the new SafeGuard Cyber CEO. Lehman, former ExtraHop Chief Revenue Officer and astute FireEye sales leader, is joining us as we navigate a period of exciting growth, and address the urgent need for enterprises to detect and respond to today’s communication-based threats.
Our Senior Vice President in Marketing, Lisa Hayashi, connected with Chris to share with us his enthusiasm for his new adventure.
Lisa: We are thrilled to have you on board, Chris! Tell us a little bit about your background.
Chris: Good to be here, Lisa, thank you.
Well, I have more than 20 years of experience working for some of the highest growth and most successful technology companies in the world. Most recently, I was the Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) for ExtraHop where over 4 years I helped lead their transformation into cybersecurity’s leading Enterprise Network Detection and Response (NDR) company.
During my time at ExtraHop, I was responsible for all Go to Market functions.We achieved record growth in ARR, NRR, bookings, and revenue, culminating in the successful sale of the business to Bain Capital and Crosspoint Ventures. Before ExtraHop, I held senior leadership positions at FireEye, Salesforce.com, EMC, and Documentum.
Lisa: What are a few reasons you decided to join our journey at SafeGuard Cyber?
Chris: I decided to join SafeGuard Cyber on three important factors: the technology, the market size, and the people.
I wasn’t actively looking to leave Extrahop but the team at Night Dragon encouraged me to consider a first-time CEO role. SafeGuard Cyber is a company in a huge market. It's one thing to have great technology, but to be successful, you have to have great technology in a market where a lot of money is being spent.
Finally, the most important thing that made SafeGuard Cyber so attractive was the people. The team is enthusiastic, helpful, and passionate about the problem they are solving in the market.
Lisa: That’s awesome to hear. CEOs often have a book about business that they like, or are currently reading. Would you like to recommend one to your new team here at SafeGuard Cyber?
Chris: Right now, I’m in the process of reading Trillion-Dollar Coach. It’s a biography about Bill Campbell, who was a mentor and coach to executives at Google, Apple, Facebook, and a number of other highly successful companies.
In a nutshell, his message is that success is ‘all about the people’. The opportunity to create a high performing culture based on trust and accountability where people thrive gets me very excited.
Lisa: Cybersecurity is growing because there are bad actors and nation-states targeting enterprises and government agencies at an unprecedented pace. It can, at times, be a noisy market. What attracted you to the problem that SafeGuard Cyber solves?
Chris: One of the challenges in cybersecurity is that bad actors are always finding new ways to execute attacks. One of the biggest gaps in organizations security are modern communication channels (social, messaging, collaboration, etc.) because these channels are largely not monitored today. Attackers are aware of these vulnerabilities and increasingly executing their attacks through these channels.
SafeGuard is uniquely positioned to help enterprises protect all of their communications. I believe this is one of the biggest growth opportunities in cybersecurity today.
Lisa: Thank you, Chris. Looking forward to working with you!
Chris: You’re welcome, Lisa. Looking forward to it, as well.
We’re very excited to see what Chris Lehman will help us accomplish here in SafeGuard Cyber. Stay tuned for more news and updates in the future.