Ballistic Ventures Appoints Expert Cybersecurity GTM Advisors

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Feb 28, 2023, 07:00 ET

Marcus Bragg, Raffael Marty, John Spiliotis deepen VC firm's bench of distinguished advisors supporting portfolio company growth

SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 28, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Ballistic Ventures, the venture capital firm dedicated exclusively to funding and incubating entrepreneurs and innovations in cybersecurity, today announced it added three go-to-market (GTM) experts, Marcus Bragg, Raffael Marty and John Spiliotis, as advisors. They join fellow Ballistic advisors as cybersecurity leaders who are guiding the firm's portfolio companies in their growth.

"With Marcus, Raffy and John's track records and expertise in GTM for cybersecurity, our portfolio companies gain access to expert advisory support – for all types of sales strategies, across all stages of their growth. From top-down models and PLG, to channel and MSSP programs – these advisors have seen and driven it all," said Barmak Meftah, General Partner of Ballistic Ventures. "We're excited to have our GTM advisors join Ballistic, and we'll continue to tap our networks for cybersecurity leaders who want to work together to make our portfolio companies successful and secure our digital world."

Marcus Bragg has more than 20 years of leadership experience in customer-focused GTM design, talent management, sales, marketing and customer success. He is currently Chief Operating Officer of Netlify. Previously, Bragg served as Chief Operating Office of AlienVault, seeing the company through its successful acquisition by AT&T. He also served as SVP of worldwide sales and customer success at Zendesk, where he helped grow the company from $70M to $300M in revenue and through one of 2014's most successful IPOs.

Raffael Marty has worked in all areas of cybersecurity across research, engineering, investing, advising and corporate strategy. Currently, he is EVP and General Manager of Cybersecurity Management at ConnectWise, responsible for all aspects of the cybersecurity business, and is an industry expert on managed security service providers (MSSP). Previously, he was head of research and intelligence at Forcepoint. At Sophos, he ran security analytics and oversaw the big data strategy, which he helped pioneer as the founder of analytics companies PixlCloud and Loggly. Additionally, Marty held key roles at IBM Research, ArcSight and Splunk.

John Spiliotis has over 35 years of technology sales operating leadership experience, most recently as an independent-sales and GTM advisor to venture-backed cybersecurity companies. Previously, he spearheaded much of Palo Alto Networks' hyper-growth and was responsible for driving all of its direct and indirect sales in the Americas ($1.8B or 70% of all sales). Before Palo Alto Networks, he was VP of Avaya's global channel organization and led GTM strategy. He has also held senior-level positions at Cisco, Extreme Networks and Redback Networks (acquired by Ericsson). Spiliotis currently serves on the boards at NetSPI, Reliaquest and Theatro.

For more information on the Ballistic team and its advisors, visit ballisticventures.com/team.

About Ballistic Ventures

Ballistic Ventures is a venture capital firm solely dedicated to early-stage cybersecurity and cyber-related companies. The partners have spent their entire careers defending against every cyber threat conceivable. Members of the firm have founded, operated and funded over 90 successful cybersecurity firms – including Abnormal Security, AlienVault, Arbitrum (Offchain Labs), ArcSight, Arkose Labs, Fortify, Interos, ISS, Mandiant and Shape Security – led over 10,000 security professionals globally, and have 40+ years of experience in venture capital. The Ballistic portfolio includes Alethea, ArmorCode, Concentric AI, Nudge Security, Oligo Security, Pangea, Perygee, Talon Cyber Security and Veza. Our experience provides entrepreneurs impactful support from people focused on the same mission. Our networks and relationships open doors for our founders. Learn more at ballisticventures.com.

SOURCE Ballistic Ventures