As cloud adoption accelerates, enterprises are turning to cloud security providers to secure their environments.
Private players like Wiz (founded in 2020) and Orca Security (founded in 2018) have ridden this wave to notch $10B and $1.8B valuations, respectively.
Meanwhile, cybersecurity behemoth Palo Alto Networks ($64B market cap) has acquired more than 10 companies as it built its Prisma Cloud platform and other security offerings.
Competition is fierce, with companies vying for each other’s highest value customers.
To understand how enterprises are making cloud security purchasing decisions, we mined Yardstiq transcripts — interviews that CB Insights conducts with software buyers — as well as Analyst Briefing surveys submitted to CB Insights by vendors.
Here are a 4 key takeaways from this analysis:
- Accuracy & actionable alerts: Buyers are evaluating platforms’ accuracy at detecting and reporting security events, including the volume of false positives/false negatives. Actionable intel and prioritization around alerts for security teams are key.
- Lightweight solutions: Buyers cite ease of deployment and ongoing maintenance as critical factors in their evaluations. With the move to cloud environments, agentless security has become top of mind.
- Pricing model clarity: Buyers have mentioned pricing model clarity and flexibility as a key component of their evaluations and negotiations with vendors. For instance, one buyer we spoke with negotiated a 60-70% discount.
- Integrated solutions: Some enterprise leaders are looking to bundle security solutions from one vendor vs. buying from several to create efficiencies and cost savings. Against incumbents like Palo Alto which have largely built their offerings via acquisitions, cloud security startups like Aqua Security, Ermetic, and Sysdig are differentiating themselves as unified platforms.
Below, we’ll dive deeper to highlight several key cloud security platforms, how much their enterprise buyers are paying, and vendor-specific buyer perspectives.
How much are cybersecurity executives paying for cloud security?
Based on Yardstiq interviews with buyers and Analyst Briefing survey data submitted by vendors, we found that annual contract values typically range from $10K to $800K.
