00:24:02 · Varun Badhwar, Siddhartha Ahluwalia
We rely on all of the software that isn't written by us, and more and more and more vulnerabilities that continue to be discovered. But whose problem is to kind of fix things? [00:24:13] S1: I think it requires a very different shift in mindset because earlier, when code was written, it was assumed to be secure. And now we have to just give up with that mindset that any code written cannot be secure because the writing of code has become so easy. [00:24:32] S0: Yeah, I think I think you had, I would say, three core assumptions. That's one. Second was the person writing the code was at least a trained software developer. Right now, my mom and dad can write software. Uh scary thought. The third thing was if there was generally an implicit trust in open source. If I'm grabbing it from open source, people have had eyes on it, it'll be fine. Today, nation state actors, North Korea, China, Russia, others are completely dominating the ability to kind of push malicious code through open source because we have entirely left this space open. Yeah. It's like your doors may be locked, your windows are open. Anyone can ship you any code. [00:25:16] S1: Yeah. [00:25:16] S0: And your pipelines are just pulling in automatically these updates. It's a wild thought to think about right now when you think about the fact that anybody can go take over an account without a lot of effort in open source and push malware that affects 500 million downloads a week.
00:25:16 · Varun Badhwar, Siddhartha Ahluwalia
[00:25:16] S0: And your pipelines are just pulling in automatically these updates. It's a wild thought to think about right now when you think about the fact that anybody can go take over an account without a lot of effort in open source and push malware that affects 500 million downloads a week. [00:25:37] S1: So I assume uh at Endor, raising money would have become much easier, right? Because you had already made so $250 million for your stakeholders. The first round on Endor was $25 million, I'm right. And second round was 90.
00:25:53 · Varun Badhwar
[00:25:53] S0: Yes. Yeah. Yeah, look, I I am blessed to have a good track record, and fundraising has never been the issue here. Every round has been preempted in this company. We've never really had to go out officially and run a run a fundraise process. Uh, but you know, at the same time, the expectations get higher too. I don't think anybody is expecting Varun Badhwar to go create another $250 million exit outcome, right? I think the the belief, my personal belief, my own expectation of me, let alone everybody else, is that I've did that before. I learned how to build a much bigger scale business within Palo Alto Networks. And now I want to build an IP oval business independently. So expectations get higher, pressure gets higher. Also, I think we just we haven't talked about the elephant in the room. Like building a business and navigating it through today is wild compared to 2020, you know, 2017, 2018. CI, like the speed of change of technology. I may have product market fit today, I may not have it in a quarter, even though I'm a scaled up startup. Or, you know, a company with one-tenth of the capital could potentially race to building something relatively competitive much faster. So the question always becomes like, what's the moat now, right? How much of it is, you know, people say this is a system of record mode, data mode. Sure, but I think I think those things matter. Um ultimately, I think what your customers believe about you and your ability to support and service them, because they're all going through the same shifts. Um, how we react, how we show our velocity of shipping with speed and thoughtfulness, um, how we help them navigate all these changes uh matter the most. I think having loyal customers and loyal employees that help you navigate through this change is the best thing you can have. But I call it wild because of certainly those two things I mentioned about competitive dynamics, product market fit dynamics. Um but also it's like every morning when I wake up and before I get on my phone, there's this little thing in the back of my head. I'm like, oh, like what's what's today? What's today bringing out, right? What is the what is the next big launch from a lab? What is the next big thing happening in the industry?
00:28:15 · Varun Badhwar, Siddhartha Ahluwalia
What you know, we not talked about regulation yet, but there's so much chatter right now about open weight models and is US going to regulate. Are certain things gonna get bought banned? Like this has consequences. These have lasting consequences for companies like us. And uh the good news then, I comfort myself thinking I'm not the only one. If you're Sam Altman, if you're Dario, it doesn't matter if you're running the best biggest labs in the world. That same paranoia has to be living in the back of your head every single day. [00:28:48] S1: Yeah, because uh Sam and Dario both have the fear of getting disrupted by Chinese open source, right?
00:28:48 · Siddhartha Ahluwalia, Varun Badhwar
[00:28:48] S1: Yeah, because uh Sam and Dario both have the fear of getting disrupted by Chinese open source, right? [00:28:56] S0: So everybody has the fear of I am not in full control. Uh, but you know, as a as a founder, multi-time founder, the last two times I built companies, I felt I have full control of this car. And then there are things outside I don't control. Now it's like I don't control the outside. Also, who knows what shifts, right? Um it's exhilarating, it's uh scary at the same time. And so you just have to have a very balanced view of what are the things I control. I usually chuckle when people ask me what's the two to three year roadmap of Endor. I'm like, if I could tell you with high degree of confidence what six months holds, it would be a win. Uh because I have now learned to live with situations where we literally last quarter, two of the products we shipped last quarter, if at the beginning of quarter you had asked me if we would be building those things, I would say no way. So that's the pace of change that we're living in, and that's the pace of change I'm trying to help my employees understand is the new reality, is living in controlled chaos or organized chaos, as I call it. [00:30:01] S1: And how big is the team today at Endor? [00:30:03] S0: Endor is closing in to about 200 people. Uh Bangalore has about 55, 60 people now, and then uh 140, most of whom are in the US. [00:30:17] S1: And in US, everybody's here in the Bay Area?
00:30:17 · Siddhartha Ahluwalia, Varun Badhwar
[00:30:17] S1: And in US, everybody's here in the Bay Area? [00:30:20] S0: So Bay Area is a high degree of concentration. This is a headquarters where you're at today. Um, but you know, our go-to-market team is fairly spread out because we have more geographic focus. We also have an office in Europe, uh, in the Netherlands. Uh, it's a kind of a lot of our deep researchers and engineering talent is built there. Uh, and we're continuing to hire. So if anybody's listening here and interested in working at the intersection of uh the biggest change of our time, which is agentix software development and how to secure it, then you know, we're looking for people around the world. [00:30:50] S1: Why is there a Darth Vader in your office?