Latest / Israel Tech Daily / Upwind's round grows to $400 million, IAI folds Elta into the parent, Tel Aviv falls after the election

Transcript

Upwind's round grows to $400 million, IAI folds Elta into the parent, Tel Aviv falls after the election · Israel Tech Daily

• 0:00
  Noa: Upwind, the Israeli cloud security company, has closed a $400 million round at a $3.8 billion valuation, a hundred million more than the round we told you about in October.
• 0:18
  Noa: Good morning, it's Thursday, the twenty-ninth of October. I'm Noa.
• 0:22
  Eli: And I'm Eli.
• 0:23
  Noa: Today, Upwind's bigger round, Israel Aerospace Industries folds its radar maker Elta into the parent company, and the Tel Aviv market's rough day after the election.
• 0:34
  Noa: Upwind says it has completed a $400 million Series C at a $3.8 billion valuation. Globes reports that Bessemer Venture Partners led, with existing investors including Greylock, Cyberstarts and Salesforce Ventures, and Canapi Ventures joining as a new investor.
• 0:52
  Eli: The size is the news. CTech says the round was first announced in September at $300 million, and it has now grown by a hundred million while keeping the same valuation. That valuation is more than double January's $1.5 billion, when Upwind raised $250 million.
• 1:09
  Noa: The company says its revenue has quadrupled so far this year, according to SiliconANGLE. Globes estimates annual recurring revenue this year at $80 million or more. SiliconANGLE lists Siemens, Roku and Carvana among its customers, and puts total funding at about $830 million.
• 1:28
  Eli: There is also the Datadog question. Globes, citing The Information, says the round shows Upwind turned down a $4 billion offer from Datadog. SiliconANGLE notes the announcement itself doesn't mention it, and CTech has asked whether a firm offer was ever made.
• 1:44
  Noa: Upwind builds a cloud security platform that uses runtime data from cloud workloads, APIs and AI agents, according to SiliconANGLE. It says customers can open it from the AWS console, and it also runs on Azure, Google Cloud and Oracle Cloud.
• 2:00
  Eli: CTech adds that in September Upwind acquired the Israeli startup Aegis, reportedly for tens of millions of dollars in stock, and launched a unit called Upwind AI Labs.
• 2:12
  Noa: A round that size usually means a lot of hiring ahead, so a word from our sponsor, SkillSim. Instead of a take-home that eats a candidate's week, you send a thirty-minute interactive scenario, built in about a minute, and the candidate plays it out. Try it free at skillsim.co.
• 2:28
  Eli: Back to the news. Israel Aerospace Industries says its board approved merging the radar maker Elta into the parent company.
• 2:36
  Noa: CTech says Elta becomes one of IAI's four main divisions, instead of a separate subsidiary. It has about 4,500 employees, nearly a third of the workforce, and CTech puts its 2025 sales at about $2.2 billion, roughly a quarter of IAI's total.
• 2:53
  Eli: The stated reason is overlap. CTech says separate headquarters and management cost tens of millions of shekels a year. Defence Industry Europe reports completion is subject to state approvals, by the end of 2027 or a later agreed date, and IAI says employees keep their terms.
• 3:11
  Noa: CTech says the process began about a year ago, led by the Government Companies Authority, and the government approved it in July. The same board meeting named Shlomi Sudri general manager of the Systems, Missiles and Space group, succeeding Guy Bar Lev, who became chief executive about two months ago.
• 3:29
  Noa: Yesterday we told you Tel Aviv shares fell the morning after the election. By the close, the JPost reports, the TA-35 index was down about 2.9 percent and the TA-125 down about 3.3 percent, with construction shares falling roughly 8 percent.
• 3:47
  Eli: Globes calls it one of the worst trading days in months, wiping out all of October's gains, with the local volatility index up 30 percent. The shekel weakened too. CTech has the dollar at about 3.13 shekels, up from about 3.02 on Tuesday.
• 4:02
  Eli: Government bonds fell as well. The JPost has the ten-year yield up about 0.06 points, to around 4.1 percent.
• 4:10
  Noa: Globes says investors had priced in a change of government, and the fear now is a stalemate, with no stable government and a delayed state budget. We are reporting the market moves only, and the final vote count is still to come.
• 4:23
  Eli: One more thread on Classiq. At the Tech1 conference in Tel Aviv, Entrée Capital's Avi Eyal told CTech that Intel's purchase shows many of the barriers holding back deep tech have fallen, and that capital for the field is abundant.
• 4:38
  Noa: Eyal's reasoning was that in quantum, where use cases are still unclear, a software business separate from the hardware would be ready by the time the hardware caught up. He also warned that deep tech takes longer and needs deeper commitment from investors.
• 4:52
  Noa: On the same panel, Carlo Biggio of Accel said investors who once avoided fields with physical components are now chasing semiconductors, and that models are speeding up drug discovery. He named energy and robotics as other areas drawing demand.
• 5:07
  Eli: Globes reports Entrée holds about 15 percent of Classiq and will receive about $330 million from the deal. Those are Globes' figures, and the final payout depends on the definitive terms.
• 5:19
  Noa: Now the quick round-up.
• 5:20
  Eli: Also at Tech1, Amit Assaraf, co-founder of Koi, which Palo Alto Networks acquired, told a cyber panel that defenders are years behind attackers. Zero Networks founder Benny Lakunishok said defenders win in the long run, but attackers have the advantage for now, CTech reports.
• 5:39
  Noa: On the same panel, lawyer Yoav Manor of Shibolet said there are many M and A opportunities, but buyers are more selective today.
• 5:46
  Eli: Reindeer AI chief executive Yoav Naveh said companies cannot afford to wait on AI. He says a major supplier cut the time to produce a price quote from hours to minutes, which lifted its business activity by 20 percent. That is the company's claim.
• 6:02
  Noa: And Globes reports the Classiq founders' payout. Co-founder Yehuda Naveh and his son Amir hold about 9 percent, roughly $200 million, and the 150 employees' options could share up to $450 million.
• 6:16
  Eli: Whether the final vote count settles the Tel Aviv market, and whether Upwind's next announcement answers the Datadog question.
• 6:24
  Noa: This episode was brought to you by SkillSim. Founders hiring without an HR team can give every applicant the same short scenario and read the full transcripts, so the first screen rests on how people actually answer. Check them out at skillsim.co.
• 6:39
  Noa: Follow Israel Tech Daily, and read more at startuptofollow.com.
• 6:43
  Eli: See you tomorrow morning.