Isovalent

About Isovalent

Isovalent, founded in 2017 by Dan Wendlandt and Thomas Graf, is a prominent figure in cloud-native networking and security. The company's genesis is rooted in the founders' extensive backgrounds in open-source and kernel development. Graf, a long-time contributor to the Linux kernel networking community, founded the Cilium project after identifying the revolutionary potential of eBPF technology. Wendlandt, a founding engineer at Nicira, a pioneer in software-defined networking (SDN), shared the vision that eBPF could unlock the next wave of innovation in network security. Their paths converged while working on the Open vSwitch project, laying the groundwork for their future collaboration.

The firm's business model centers on commercializing open-source technologies, primarily eBPF and Cilium. eBPF (extended Berkeley Packet Filter) is a Linux kernel technology that allows for running sandboxed programs in the operating system's kernel, enabling developers to extend kernel capabilities without modifying the source code. This provides a powerful and efficient way to implement networking, security, and observability functions. Isovalent leverages this foundation to offer enterprise-grade solutions. The company generates revenue by providing Isovalent Cilium Enterprise, a supported and hardened version of the open-source Cilium project, which includes enterprise-specific features for security, compliance, and advanced observability. Their client base consists of large enterprises, telcos, and platform engineering teams that are in advanced stages of Kubernetes adoption and require scalable connectivity, security, and observability for mission-critical workloads. Notable customers include Adobe, Bell Canada, Capital One, and Datadog.

The core product, Isovalent Cilium Enterprise, is built upon the open-source project Cilium, which has become a de facto standard for networking, observability, and security in Kubernetes environments. It has been selected as the default networking layer in major public cloud managed Kubernetes offerings like Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) and Amazon EKS Anywhere. The platform utilizes eBPF to deliver identity-based security, network segmentation, deep observability into network flows, and traffic visibility at the kernel level. This approach avoids the overhead associated with traditional sidecar models. Key features include multi-cluster connectivity, advanced load-balancing, L7-aware network policies, and transparent encryption. Isovalent also created Tetragon, another open-source project that complements Cilium with enhanced security capabilities, including runtime security policy enforcement and visibility into application processes.

The company achieved significant milestones, including a $29 million Series A funding round in 2020 with investors like Andreessen Horowitz and Google, followed by a $40 million Series B in 2022 led by Thomvest Ventures, which included Microsoft's M12 fund. This strategic backing from major cloud providers underscored the importance of Cilium and eBPF in the ecosystem. In a landmark event, Cisco announced its intent to acquire Isovalent in December 2023, a deal that was reportedly valued at around $650 million and closed in April 2024. Following the acquisition, the Isovalent team joined Cisco's Security Business Group, with Cisco committing to the continued development of the open-source Cilium and eBPF communities.