Cybersecurity Market Update: May 2024 Insights & Trends

Welcome to the monthly wrap-up issue of Return on Security, where I’ll cover this month’s most relevant cybersecurity market and funding updates. I spend hours collecting, curating, and analyzing this information every week, so you don’t need to - here we go👇

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Table of Contents

• By the Numbers

• Funding Insights

• Global Distribution

• Mergers & Acquisitions

• Top Content For the Month

• Return on Security Newsletter Issues

• Data Methodology and Sources

• About Return on Security

By the Numbers

Coming off the heels of the RSA Conference in the first week of May, the industry saw a resurgence of larger and later-stage deals. This uptick in funding is consistent with the funding increases across the industry each year.

Funding Insights

The cybersecurity industry extended its funding rally in May 2024, reaching $1.7 billion, a 13% increase from April 2024. This marks the second month in a row in 2024 that funding has crossed over $1 billion.

May 2024 funding was distributed across 63 events in 38 unique cybersecurity product categories, with a major focus on cloud security and application security.

Wiz led the charge in May 2024 in the Cloud Security category, accounting for $1 billion in funding (58% of the month’s total) and continuing its meteoric rise and domination in the industry.

Here is a breakdown of funding by product category:

Global Distribution

In May 2024, the cybersecurity sector saw even more global investment activity, with firms from 13 countries securing significant funding.

American companies continued to lead the space, capturing 68% of the total funding, or $1.4 billion, across 43 events. Israel came in second, accounting for 9.5% of the total funding, or $61 million, through six events.

The United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Spain tied for third place, each collecting 3.5% of total funding for May 2024. I expect a continued uptick in European funding, with Evolution Equity Partners raising $1.1 billion for a new cybersecurity and AI fund.

Mergers & Acquisitions

While May was not as busy as April by volume, with 22 transactions, May saw a few high-profile transactions accounting for $7.1 billion. In comparison, April saw 25 transactions accounting for over $12 billion.

Top Content For the Month

Some of my favorite Great Reads and other content from this past month.

• Signal v. Noise in the RSA Innovation Sandbox - This is a reboot of the blog post Rami McCarthy and I put together last year, analyzing the history and outcomes of the Innovation Sandbox competition at the RSA Conference, updated with 2023 and 2024 data.

• Rather Than Measuring Risk, Fix an Interesting Problem - Andy Ellis, former CSO at Akamai, discusses the challenges of measuring risk in enterprise security and suggests focusing on fixing specific problems instead.

• When You Destroy the Tools of Creativity - Something different this week from one of my favorite vibe economists, Kyla Scanlon, and her take on why that latest Apple iPad ad had a visceral response for a lot of people.

And an interview I did with Daniel Miessler, which was a lot of fun!

Return on Security Newsletter Issues

Here are the past weekly newsletters from this month.

• Security, Funded #142 - Nobody Inflate, Nobody Get Hurt

• Security, Funded #143 - Putting the AI in RSA

• Security, Funded #144 - The Sound of Silence

• Security, Funded #145 - The Economic Shifts Heard Round the World

Data Methodology and Sources

• All of the data is captured point-in-time from publicly available sources.

• All financial figures are converted to U.S. dollars (USD) when collected.

• Company country locations are pulled from publicly available sources.

• Companies are categorized using our own system at Return on Security, and we write all of the company descriptions.

• Sometimes, the details about deals, like who led the round, how much money was raised, or the deal stage, might get updated after the issue is first published.

• Let us know if you spot any errors, and we’ll fix them.

About Return on Security

Return on Security is all about breaking down the cybersecurity industry for you with expert analysis, hard facts, and real-life stories. The goal? To keep security pros, entrepreneurs, and investors ahead in a fast-moving field. Read more about the “Why” here.

Feel free to borrow any data, charts, or advice you find here. Just make sure to give a shoutout to Return on Security when you do.

Thank you for reading. If you liked this summary, please share it with your friends, colleagues, and anyone interested in the cybersecurity market.

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