Startup of the Day - Covertix
The BizSpark startup of the day is Covertix, based in Israel. You will find below an interview with Tzach Kaufmann, co-founder and CTO of Covertix. All the best to them and congrats for being the startup of the day!
Website: www.covertix.com.
Interview with Tzach Kaufmann, co-founder and CTO of Covertix
Tell us who you are and your role in the company:
I love technology and innovation, worked in start-ups and enterprises focusing on networking, security and large IT projects. Prior to Covertix, I was a product manager at Radware (NSDQ: RDWR). Before Radware I was working as a Professional Services Manager at Kavado, a web application firewall vendor.
How do you feel being the most promising ‘Startup of the Day’ per Microsoft BizSpark?
We were very excited to find out that we were chosen to be Startup of the day. Covertix went a long way from an idea on a piece of paper to a live and kicking innovative enterprise security product recognized by leading analysts.
What is your company’s mission?
Very simple, secure organization’s critical information, anytime, anywhere. Our vision is to become the de facto standard for securing enterprise sensitive documents and files within and outside the boundaries of the organization. Allowing companies to “own” their data regardless of where it is.
In 140 characters or less, tell us what your company does:
By protecting the data itself, Covertix "smart file" technology enables to track, control and secure files & documents ANYTIME, ANYWHERE!
How did you get the idea for your company?
As a professional services manager for a software security company, I was often asked by the customers for a solution for information protection which goes beyond the perimeter, business needs required information to flow and so a different approach was needed which goes beyond firewall.
Tell us about your funding history. Are you currently looking for funding? If so, how much?
Covertix has raised close to $1m from the Office of the Chief Scientist of Israel, the Iris Ventures technology incubator and private investors. Covertix is in the midst of closing a subsequent round in the region of $1m to help us expand market reach to other territories.
How many employees do you have? How many developers?
Covertix is still young with fewer than 10 employees, most in development.
Are you hiring? If yes, what are you hiring and where?
We are looking for killers in QA & Sales areas.
Which platform are you building on? Why?
Our platform is Windows, with most of the product written in unmanaged C++. We chose to use unmanaged C++ mainly because we are doing a lot of low level system programming.
Where do you see opportunities today in the Software/internet area?
In recent years, the landscape of security threats expanded to include attacks on the information itself. At the same time, numerous regulations (PCI-DSS, CA-1386, most recently, HITECH act) require better protection of data. However, threats come in many forms, internal threat, industrial espionage or organized crime harvesting of PII information. To help tackle these security issues, a new breed of security products is required as current solutions were not planned to handle these scenarios. Consequently, IRM, information-centric solutions are positioned to capitalize on the growing need.
What do you think about the BizSpark Program?
We were delighted when we discovered Microsoft Bizspark program. Startup companies in the first few years have no income (or very small amount) and the plan helped us expedite the development of our flagship product Cx-Sense.
Do you have any advice for young Software entrepreneurs?
The best advice I can think of is to be patient and not give up on your dreams. The road to a successful startup is long with many ups and downs along the way, so make sure you enjoy the ride.
Who’s your role model?
Stephen Hawking is a role model of mine showing how one can overcome difficulties and achieve ones goals.
What’s the ONE THING you would like readers to take away from this interview?
Don’t be afraid to dream and try new ideas.