Veza's Tarun Thakur on excelling at go-to-market at every stage

Tarun Thakur introduces Veza as a next-generation identity security company that has grown significantly over its five-year journey. The company serves 200 customers across Fortune 500 and Fortune 100 enterprises with a team of approximately 200 people. Veza operates with a strong enterprise focus, taking a top-down approach to sales and customer acquisition.

The company maintains a primarily US-based operation with 90% of the team located domestically, while 10% operates from Slovenia in Eastern Europe, reflecting a strategic international presence in their organizational structure.

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Tarun's entrepreneurial journey began with deep technical roots, starting with assembly language programming at Seagate and later working at Compaq. His most formative corporate experience came at Data Domain, where he witnessed what great scale looks like and experienced working with exceptional products.

The transition to entrepreneurship in 2014 happened somewhat unexpectedly - initially planning to join another company, Tarun found himself drawn into an idea that evolved into his first startup. He reflects on this period with characteristic humility, admitting he didn't truly understand what it meant to start and build a company during those early years from 2014 to 2018.

"You know, the first time being a founder from 2014 to 2018, I really didn't know what it means to start a company and what it means to build a company."

Despite the steep learning curve, this first venture (Dosh) was successfully acquired by Rubrik in 2018. The experience became invaluable education in team building, fundraising, and product-market fit strategies, ultimately fueling his conviction to start another company.

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The founding insight for Veza emerged from a fundamental question about the state of cybersecurity. Despite the abundance of security tooling spanning networks, endpoints, and SaaS applications, data breaches continued to occur weekly. This contradiction led Tarun and his co-founders to examine a critical gap in the security landscape.

Drawing from their extensive background building data companies at scale - from file systems to data management and protection systems - they focused on a specific challenge: securing access to data. In 2019-2020, as data security became a prominent theme, they recognized that existing solutions weren't addressing the core access control problem.

"What does it take to go secure access to data? We have so much security tooling in the world from network to endpoint to SaaS, yet there's a breach every week. Why is this happening?"

Timestamp: [2:20-3:04]

Tarun's second-time founder experience brought a crucial lesson about market validation. Rather than diving immediately into product development, Veza dedicated 9-10 months to extensive customer discovery. This market-first approach led to an unconventional but strategic first hire decision.

Instead of hiring an engineer, designer, or product manager, Veza's first employee was a Sales Development Representative (SDR). This choice reflected their commitment to understanding customer needs before building solutions. The SDR was tasked with a simple but powerful mission: secure meetings with five prospects per week using just a one-page pitch.

"The first employee we hired was an SDR, not an engineer, not a designer, not a product manager. We said, 'Hey, here is a one-pager pitch, could you get me in front of five prospects a week?'"

This strategy emphasized a fundamental principle: while product, team, and capital are all important, market understanding is paramount. The focus was on understanding not just customer problems, but the "why now" - the urgent, timely reasons that would drive immediate action rather than eventual consideration.

Timestamp: [3:04-3:58]

One customer conversation became the defining moment that reshaped Veza's entire product vision. Initially, the team was focused on building a data security platform centered around scanning and classification in the cloud. However, a conversation with a large enterprise customer challenged this fundamental assumption.

The customer's feedback was both simple and profound. Rather than questioning the technical approach, they questioned the problem selection itself. With numerous existing tools for data scanning and classification, the customer redirected attention to a more pressing, unaddressed need.

"Why would you go solve this problem when there are n number of tools available to solve this problem? But I have this problem: I have these users who access data, and I have no way to know who's accessing what."

The customer took the unusual step of documenting their current processes and desired improvements in a two-page Word document, essentially providing a detailed specification for what would become Veza's core product. Their request was elegantly simple yet technically complex: create an "X-ray machine" that could provide baseline visibility into user access patterns across organizational systems.

"Instead of securing the data, it's looking at the access to the data - who has access to the data... Can you be that X-ray machine for me?"

Timestamp: [3:58-5:14]

The customer's insight crystallized into what Tarun calls a "founding moment" - one of many critical junctures in a company's evolution. The realization was elegant in its simplicity: the fundamental question wasn't about data protection mechanisms, but about access visibility and control.

"Such a simple question, right? Who has access to what, and who can take what action?"

This insight expanded beyond mere access inventory to include capability mapping - understanding not just who could reach data, but what actions they could perform once they had access. This dual focus on access rights and action permissions became the foundation of Veza's identity security platform.

The team immediately validated this pivot through subsequent customer conversations, finding consistent positive response to this refined problem statement. This validation gave them confidence to commit fully to the new direction, marking what Tarun describes as a true "founding moment" for the company.

"You may start a company, but then you need these founding moments - and there are many of them in the company building journey."

The pivot was decisive: instead of pursuing data security, governance, and lineage, Veza would focus specifically on solving the data access problem. This clarity of purpose enabled them to move quickly toward MVP development with a clear understanding of their market need.

Timestamp: [5:14-6:44]

• Market validation should precede product development - Veza spent 9-10 months in customer discovery before building
• The first hire can signal company priorities - choosing an SDR over technical roles emphasized market-first approach
• Customer feedback can fundamentally reshape product vision - a single conversation pivoted Veza from data security to access control
• "Why now" is more critical than "why" - timing and urgency drive customer action more than problem existence
• Founding moments happen multiple times throughout a company's journey, not just at incorporation
• Simple questions often reveal complex, unaddressed problems - "who has access to what" became a multi-billion dollar market opportunity
• Second-time founders bring valuable perspective on balancing product, team, capital, and market considerations

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Companies:

• Seagate - Tarun's first job writing assembly language code
• Compaq - Early career position after Seagate
• Data Domain - Formative experience seeing "great scale" and exceptional products
• Dosh - Tarun's first startup, acquired by Rubrik in 2018
• Rubrik - Company that acquired Dosh
• Veza - Current company, next-generation identity security platform

People:

• Rob Witcher - Veza co-founder and chief architect
• Eric Wolford - Accel partner and podcast host

Concepts:

• Identity Security - Core market category for Veza's platform
• Data Access Control - Primary problem Veza solves vs. traditional data security
• Product-Market Fit - Critical learning from first startup experience
• Founding Moments - Tarun's concept of multiple pivotal moments in company building

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Tarun introduces his two co-founders, each bringing distinct expertise to Veza's founding team. Rob Witcher serves as chief architect, known through their shared history at Data Domain where Rob demonstrated exceptional problem-solving abilities as a "puzzle maker." The third co-founder, Maalu, brings deep algorithmic expertise from IBM Research in Almaden, where Tarun first met him 10-12 years prior.

Rather than going through traditional founder-matching processes often encouraged by venture capitalists, this team formed through long-standing professional relationships and mutual respect. Tarun emphasizes that co-founder relationships must endure not just years but decades, making trust the singular most important factor in partner selection.

"I believe for founders out there and entrepreneurs that this is such a special relationship - not an year but decades enduring, durable relationship - that the only thing that matters is trust."

When asked about the durability of their partnership, Tarun confirms their commitment transcends the typical ups and downs of startup life. The shared challenges of building a company have actually strengthened their bond rather than testing it.

Timestamp: [6:44-7:41]

Moving from MVP to product development revealed the true complexity of Veza's mission. What initially appeared as a straightforward access visibility problem quickly unveiled itself as a massive scale challenge. The mathematics were daunting: an organization with 5,000 users accessing 50 different systems, each with multiple permission entitlements, created an exponential data complexity problem.

This realization led to a critical technical challenge that the founding team had never encountered before - how to build pagination in graph databases and visualize massive interconnected datasets at enterprise scale. The problem required expertise beyond their existing technical knowledge base.

"Very quickly, Eric, we realized from MVP into 9 months or 6 months, this is a very large scale problem because the cardinality of this problem - you may only have 5,000 users in organization, but if you have access to 50 different systems with each permission entitlements - this is a large scale data problem."

Timestamp: [7:41-8:19]

Faced with unprecedented technical challenges in graph visualization at scale, Tarun and his co-founder Maalu took an unconventional approach to skill development. Rather than hiring consultants or attempting to solve the problems internally, they identified the leading academic expert in the field.

Their research led them to Professor Polo at Georgia Tech, recognized as having the best graph PhD program in the United States. The team committed to deep learning, reading 10 of Professor Polo's research papers and conducting 20 calls with him to understand the intricacies of large-scale graph visualization.

This academic partnership proved prescient - Professor Polo's students have gone on to work at cutting-edge companies like OpenAI, validating the quality of expertise they accessed. The approach demonstrates how startups can leverage academic resources to overcome technical barriers that exceed their internal capabilities.

"One of the moments that came in our journey is like we actually need to go study how to build pagination in graph... My co-founders and I, Maalu and I specifically, did we found the best graph professor in US - Georgia Tech has the best graph PhDs - we found Professor Polo and we read 10 of his papers and we did 20 calls with him."

Timestamp: [8:12-8:52]

Blackstone's journey with Veza began through the company's systematic SDR outreach approach. Adam, Blackstone's Chief Information Security Officer, took a call from a Veza SDR and immediately recognized the platform's potential. His response was both enthusiastic and strategic, identifying three specific business processes where Veza could add immediate value.

Adam outlined three critical areas: access reviews, lifecycle management, and access requests. However, rather than attempting to solve all three simultaneously, he provided crucial prioritization guidance. Access reviews became the starting point because it represented an end-user business process with immediate pain points.

"There are three processes I want you to go solve: access reviews, lifecycle management, and access request... I want you to go solve access review problem because that's an end-user business process and that's number one immediate pain."

The solution architecture was elegantly simple: Veza already possessed the metadata and datasets needed, requiring only a workflow layer to enable recertification processes. This insight demonstrated how existing technical capabilities could be rapidly configured to address specific customer workflows.

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Veza's success with major enterprise customers stems from a consistent pattern of revelation. Companies like Workday, Capital One, Infor, KKR, and Cargill share a common experience when first seeing Veza's platform - the sudden visibility into something they intuitively knew existed but had never been able to visualize.

The platform's core value proposition centers on the "entitlement view" - the identity-to-entitlement mapping that shows access paths throughout an organization. This visualization consistently produces what Tarun describes as "aha moments" where security leaders immediately understand both the scope of their access challenges and the potential for solution.

"The reason why we've been able to close some of these very large enterprises is we are showing them something that they know implicitly but they've never been able to see... Every time we show them this entitlement view, the identity to entitlement map, that access path, right their eyes just like an aha moment."

This pattern of immediate recognition suggests that Veza is solving a widespread, well-understood problem that simply lacked adequate tooling rather than creating awareness of a new problem category.

Timestamp: [9:55-10:32]

A pivotal learning moment came during a call with David Treski, Chief Information Security Officer at Wynn Resorts. The interaction began as a standard 30-minute CISO meeting, with Tarun allocated 25 minutes for his presentation. Following his usual approach, he spent 22 minutes delivering a comprehensive pitch about Veza's value proposition and market opportunity.

The call wasn't going well - Tarun could sense the lack of engagement and realized his approach was failing. In a moment of desperation, he abandoned his prepared presentation and launched directly into a product demonstration.

"I kept yapping and yapping and yapping pitching hard... and I said 'This is not working' because you can see from a discussion... I stopped sharing, stopped drawing, I actually brought up the demo and he immediately turned on the Zoom video and he said 'Could you just have started there instead of 22 minutes?'"

The transformation was immediate and dramatic. David not only turned on his video but wished they had begun with the demonstration rather than the lengthy pitch. This experience fundamentally changed Tarun's sales approach, teaching him that for technical products solving complex problems, demonstration often communicates value more effectively than explanation.

Timestamp: [10:32-11:20]

The David Treski experience became a template that Tarun successfully replicated across subsequent customer interactions. The pattern proved consistent with other security leaders, including Adam Evans at Royal Bank of Canada, who showed similar enthusiasm for the product demonstration while remaining unengaged during traditional pitch presentations.

This discovery crystallized into a fundamental sales methodology that prioritized product demonstration over traditional pitch approaches. The learning was particularly relevant for early-stage companies where the product's capabilities could speak more compellingly than market positioning or theoretical value propositions.

"That's my learning - that in early days, stop pitching, just show what you have built. Let the product speak for itself."

The methodology shift from pitch-first to demo-first became a repeatable framework that improved close rates and shortened sales cycles across enterprise prospects.

Timestamp: [11:20-11:58]

Veza operates as a pure land-and-expand business model with two distinct entry points for customer acquisition. The company has developed what Tarun calls a "two-lane" approach that provides flexibility in initial customer engagement while setting up expansion opportunities.

The first lane focuses on the "X-ray machine" capabilities - visibility, intelligence, and monitoring functions that provide immediate insight into access patterns. The second lane centers on identity governance, offering workflow and process management capabilities for access control.

Customer distribution between these lanes varies by quarter, typically ranging from 70-30 to 80-20 splits, with some quarters seeing 65-35 distributions. This variability suggests that customer needs and market conditions influence which entry point proves most compelling during different periods.

The initial deployment scope is deliberately constrained, with customers typically beginning by applying Veza's visibility capabilities to 10-15 systems, such as Salesforce and other core business applications.

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• Co-founder relationships must be built on trust and designed for decades-long partnerships, not just startup phases
• Complex technical challenges may require external expertise - academic partnerships can provide world-class knowledge
• Early-stage companies should prioritize product demonstrations over traditional pitch presentations
• Customer feedback can provide crucial prioritization guidance - focus on immediate pain points rather than comprehensive solutions
• "Aha moments" occur when you make invisible problems visible to customers who already understand the pain
• Land-and-expand strategies benefit from multiple entry points that accommodate different customer priorities
• Scale challenges often emerge after MVP validation, requiring technical approaches beyond founding team expertise

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People:

• Rob Witcher - Veza co-founder and chief architect, known as a "puzzle maker" from Data Domain
• Maalu - Veza co-founder with algorithmic expertise, met at IBM Research Almaden
• Professor Polo - Georgia Tech graph visualization expert, authored 22 papers
• Adam - Chief Information Security Officer at Blackstone
• David Treski - Chief Information Security Officer at Wynn Resorts
• Adam Evans - Chief Information Security Officer at Royal Bank of Canada

Companies:

• Blackstone - Major customer and investor in Veza
• Workday - Enterprise customer successfully closed by Veza
• Capital One - Major enterprise customer
• Infor - Enterprise customer
• KKR - Enterprise customer
• Cargill - Enterprise customer
• Wynn Resorts - Customer where demo-first approach was discovered
• Royal Bank of Canada - Customer where demo-first methodology was replicated
• JP Morgan - Referenced as example of large enterprise opportunity
• Georgia Tech - University with leading graph PhD program
• IBM Research Almaden - Where Tarun met co-founder Maalu
• OpenAI - Current employer of Professor Polo's students

Technical Concepts:

• Graph Pagination - Technical challenge for visualizing large-scale access relationships
• Identity-to-Entitlement Mapping - Core visualization showing access paths
• Access Reviews - First business process prioritized by Blackstone
• Lifecycle Management - Second business process identified by Blackstone
• Access Requests - Third business process identified by Blackstone

Timestamp: [6:44-12:50]

Veza's land-and-expand strategy drives impressive expansion metrics, with enterprise Net Revenue Retention reaching 147%. This growth stems from three distinct expansion vectors that provide multiple pathways for account growth within existing customers.

The first expansion vector involves scaling integration breadth - customers who begin with 10-15 systems often expand to add 100 or more integrations as they see value across their technology stack. The second vector focuses on identity scope expansion, growing from human identities to include non-human identities like service accounts and applications. The third vector represents product suite expansion, transitioning customers from the visibility product to workflow and governance capabilities.

"Our expansion in enterprise is we're expanding either adding now I want to add 100 more integrations, or I want to grow from human to non-human identities, or we want to go from the visibility product to the workflow product."

This multi-vector approach ensures that customer relationships can deepen along multiple dimensions, creating compound growth opportunities within each account while providing flexibility in expansion timing and priorities.

Timestamp: [13:03-13:29]

Veza operates what Tarun calls a "bimodal go-to-market" approach, simultaneously pursuing both mid-market and enterprise segments. This dual-motion strategy provides several strategic advantages beyond just market coverage.

Working with iconic enterprise brands like Coca-Cola, Adobe, and ServiceNow provides valuable case studies and market credibility. However, Tarun emphasizes that parallel mid-market motion offers distinct benefits, particularly in product development feedback loops. Mid-market customers often provide faster, more direct feedback that can rapidly inform engineering priorities.

"It's fun to work with the Cokes and the Coca-Colas and the Adobes and the ServiceNows of the world - iconic brands - but there is a lot more fun if you can have these two motions going in parallel."

The framework guiding this approach follows a "something new to something old" principle, suggesting that innovation should be balanced with proven market approaches. This bimodal strategy is particularly relevant in cybersecurity, where market dynamics reward both enterprise credibility and agile mid-market execution.

Timestamp: [13:29-14:14]

The bimodal approach requires distinct sales teams rather than individuals covering both segments. Tarun uses the example of Capital One versus Robin Hood to illustrate why the same salesperson cannot effectively serve both enterprise and mid-market customers - the selling motions, decision-making processes, and buyer personas are fundamentally different.

The messaging and positioning strategy emphasizes simplicity through what Veza calls the "lollipop slide" - a straightforward presentation of seven use cases where Veza excels at solving two problems and aims to address four additional ones. This use case-based selling approach allows for clear value proposition communication regardless of customer size.

"A same individual who's selling to a Capital One is not an individual who will go sell to Robin Hood. You need two different teams."

The mid-market motion accommodates customers who may only want specific, narrow solutions - such as using Veza exclusively for Snowflake access control. This granular value delivery ensures that even focused implementations provide sufficient ROI to justify customer investment.

Timestamp: [14:14-15:09]

Product-market fit recognition came through an unexpected signal in late 2023, three and a half years into Veza's journey. A sales representative based in Chicago provided the clarity Tarun needed to understand that their "Act One" - the visibility product - had achieved genuine market traction.

The representative's assessment was both simple and profound: "If I can sell in Chicago, we can sell this anywhere." This wasn't just about geographic reach - it represented validation that the product could sell in a competitive, non-tech-centric market through standard sales processes rather than founder-led or specialized technical selling.

"A rep called from Chicago and his comment was that if I can sell in Chicago we can sell this anywhere, and that is when I realized the Act One can sell on its own."

The significance wasn't just in individual deals but in the representative's ability to build sustainable, durable pipeline with predictable timing. He demonstrated the ability to forecast not just immediate closes but pipeline development quarters in advance - the hallmark of repeatable sales motion.

Timestamp: [15:15-16:44]

The Chicago representative's success went beyond individual deal closure to demonstrate true sales motion repeatability. His ability to consistently convert prospects through a multi-stage sales process provided the predictability that distinguishes sustainable growth from lucky wins.

The representative's approach exemplified what Tarun describes as the characteristic of great salespeople - not just the ability to close deals, but to build systematic pipeline development. When eight out of ten calls consistently advance to second, third, and fourth stage meetings, it indicates that the product-market fit creates natural buying momentum.

"That knack I think only great sales people have - not only can I sell this thing, but they're continuous... let me do 10 calls and if eight calls are moving to the second, to the third, to the fourth, that you know you have a repeatable motion."

This pipeline predictability became the foundation for confident scaling decisions, providing the data-driven evidence needed to justify increased investment in sales team expansion and marketing spend.

Timestamp: [16:30-17:01]

Achieving product-market fit in cybersecurity presents unique scaling challenges that differ from other software categories. Tarun emphasizes the importance of starting with a "simplistic wedge" - a non-disruptive entry point that doesn't threaten existing security ecosystems, since trust is the fundamental barrier in cybersecurity sales.

Veza's initial approach focused on the visibility plane, providing insights without requiring immediate changes to security workflows or tool replacements. However, after three years of growth, the team recognized that sustainable scaling required evolution beyond pure visibility.

"In cyber, it's very important to have a very simplistic wedge because you don't want to be too disruptive to an existing ecosystem because nobody trusts you in cyber."

The scaling insight was strategic: while one school of thought suggests maximizing growth speed after achieving product-market fit, Veza realized that truly rapid scaling (triple and double growth rates year over year) required targeting well-defined budget categories where they could replace existing solutions rather than creating new spending categories.

Timestamp: [17:01-17:49]

Veza's transition from "Act One" to "Act Two" represents a fundamental strategic shift from creating new value categories to replacing existing budget allocations. This evolution recognizes a critical principle in cybersecurity selling: customers prefer to replace underperforming solutions rather than expand their security tool portfolio.

The "something new to something old" framework guided this transition - moving from the innovative visibility capabilities (something new) to established identity governance markets (something old with existing budgets). This approach targets the well-defined identity governance budget category where customers already allocate resources and understand ROI expectations.

"It's very important in cyber to go replace something and be better than what exists - something new to something already - and so that led to our Act Two. Our Act Two became the identity governance - identity visibility or identity risk to identity governance."

This strategic pivot acknowledges that while innovation creates market differentiation, sustainable scaling in enterprise cybersecurity requires competing for existing budget dollars rather than trying to create entirely new spending categories.

Timestamp: [17:35-18:02]

• Enterprise expansion can follow multiple vectors: integration breadth, identity scope, and product suite depth
• Bimodal go-to-market strategies provide both credibility (enterprise) and agility (mid-market) advantages
• Product-market fit recognition often comes from unexpected signals showing independent sales success
• Pipeline predictability and conversion consistency indicate true repeatability beyond individual deal wins
• Cybersecurity scaling requires non-disruptive entry points due to industry trust barriers
• Sustainable growth in enterprise security requires targeting existing budget categories rather than creating new ones
• Different market segments require specialized sales teams with distinct skills and approaches
• Use case-based selling simplifies value proposition communication across customer segments

Timestamp: [12:50-18:02]

Companies:

• Salesforce - Example system where customers apply Veza visibility
• Snowflake - Platform mentioned for both visibility and mid-market use cases
• Coca-Cola - Iconic enterprise brand example
• Adobe - Enterprise customer example
• ServiceNow - Enterprise customer example
• Capital One - Enterprise sales example
• Robin Hood - Mid-market sales comparison example

Geographic Markets:

• Chicago - Market where product-market fit validation occurred

Business Concepts:

• Net Revenue Retention (NRR) - Veza's enterprise metric at 147%
• Bimodal Go-to-Market - Simultaneous mid-market and enterprise strategy
• Lollipop Slide - Veza's simplified use case presentation format
• Act One - Veza's initial visibility product phase
• Act Two - Transition to identity governance market
• Something New to Something Old - Strategic framework for market evolution

Product Categories:

• Identity Governance - Target market for Veza's Act Two evolution
• Identity Visibility - Veza's initial market entry point
• Identity Risk - Component of Veza's expanded market approach
• Non-Human Identities - Expansion vector including service accounts and applications

Timestamp: [12:50-18:02]

Intuit played a pivotal role in shaping Veza's strategic evolution from Act One to Act Two. While acknowledging the value of Veza's existing visibility capabilities, Intuit provided the crucial push toward identity governance by explicitly requesting this functionality.

This customer-driven product development approach proved prescient. Four years later, Intuit has become Veza's largest paying customer, utilizing the entire platform across their organization. The relationship exemplifies how early customer partnerships can evolve into strategic, long-term engagements when built on genuine value delivery and responsive product development.

"My all thanks goes to Intuit - they were the ones who said what you have is great, we want you to go build identity governance. Fast forward four years, largest paying customer, they have the entire platform, they own the entire platform now, four year plus customer for ours."

Tarun expresses lasting gratitude to organizations like Blackstone and Intuit for their early faith and guidance, recognizing how these partnerships shaped not just product development but the entire company trajectory.

Timestamp: [18:04-18:34]

Recognizing product-market fit triggered immediate go-to-market expansion decisions. Veza rapidly scaled their sales organization from eight to nearly thirty sellers, representing a nearly 4x growth in sales capacity. This aggressive scaling reflects confidence in the repeatability of their sales motion and the market opportunity size.

The scaling strategy focused on getting "sales teams fired up and running quickly," suggesting an emphasis on velocity and momentum rather than gradual, cautious expansion. This approach aligns with the earlier insight about the importance of moving fast once product-market fit is established.

"What we realized is we need to go get sales teams fired up and up and running quickly, and so we've scaled our sales team to close to 30 sellers now from eight."

Timestamp: [18:46-19:05]

Veza's expansion strategy includes positioning for emerging identity categories that represent significant future opportunities. Beyond traditional human identity management, the company is developing capabilities for non-human identities and what Tarun refers to as "agentic identity" - suggesting AI-driven or autonomous system identities.

This forward-looking approach ensures that as organizations increasingly deploy automated systems, AI agents, and service accounts, Veza's platform can provide comprehensive identity management across all entity types. The timing suggests anticipation of market trends rather than reactive development.

"Pick up these new things that are coming - the non-human identity, the agentic identity which we'll talk about very shortly."

Timestamp: [19:05-19:18]

Veza's expansion methodology offers customers three distinct pathways after initial visibility deployment: next-generation Privileged Access Management (PAM), next-generation Identity Governance, and continuing to enhance the core visibility platform. This approach provides flexibility while maintaining focus.

The strategy recognizes that excellence in one area creates more value than mediocrity across all areas. Rather than requiring customers to adopt the entire platform immediately, Veza allows natural expansion based on customer priorities and organizational readiness.

"When you land with the visibility and give them three options: next-gen privilege access management, next-gen identity governance, and you need to be good at one. You don't need to be good at all, and customers realize that."

This customer-centric approach builds trust by demonstrating that Veza prioritizes customer success over immediate revenue maximization, ultimately leading to stronger long-term relationships and organic expansion.

Timestamp: [19:18-19:37]

Tarun's analysis of the identity security market reveals extensive fragmentation that creates operational challenges for enterprise customers. The current landscape requires organizations to manage multiple point solutions: Duo for Multi-Factor Authentication, Okta for Single Sign-On, CyberArk for Privileged Access Management, and CrowdStrike for Identity Threat Detection and Response.

This fragmentation creates integration complexity, operational overhead, and security gaps that organizations increasingly want to consolidate. Veza's platform approach addresses this market need by providing comprehensive capabilities within a unified system.

"What I learned in identity is organizations are looking for a platform. There is so much segmentation and fragmentation in the existing identity market - Duo for MFA, Okta for single sign-on, CyberArk for PAM, CrowdStrike for ITDR - too much fragmentation."

Veza's response has been to develop seven shipping modules on a integrated platform, providing the breadth that customers require while maintaining the deep functionality expected from specialized solutions.

Timestamp: [19:37-20:03]

Customer feedback consistently reinforced the need for broader product vision beyond point solutions. To become a strategic vendor rather than a tactical tool, Veza needed to demonstrate platform capabilities that could address multiple identity challenges within a single system.

This feedback loop between customer requirements and product development created a clear imperative: organizations wanted to consolidate their identity stack rather than continue adding specialized tools. The platform approach became essential for strategic vendor consideration.

"Customers were giving you that feedback that you needed to have a more broad product vision in order for them to select you as a strategic vendor."

The realization that visibility alone wouldn't sustain long-term customer relationships or drive significant expansion revenue led to the deliberate development of complementary capabilities within the platform architecture.

Timestamp: [20:03-20:21]

When customers requested expansion beyond visibility into comprehensive identity governance, Veza faced a critical strategic decision that required intense deliberation among the founding team. A customer's feedback crystallized the challenge: to achieve meaningful expansion ("X + 10"), Veza would need to replace existing solutions rather than simply add incremental value.

This realization triggered what Tarun describes as four months of "intense debate" among the co-founders. Despite the startup urgency to move quickly, the team recognized they were contemplating a fundamental business model shift that required careful consideration.

"I went to one of our customers and I said 'Hey, first opportunity we did with you was X and we want to do X + 10.' And he said 'If you want to do X + 10, you need to replace something for me and then you can have X plus 10.'"

The decision represented a transition from building another "X-ray machine" (visibility tool) to creating a comprehensive platform for employee onboarding and identity lifecycle management. The founding team's willingness to engage in extended strategic debate, despite startup time pressures, demonstrates the intellectual honesty and long-term thinking that Tarun credits as essential to co-founder relationships.

"That's where it comes to that intellectual honesty, that intellectual bonding, where we spent 4 months debating because we realized what we were about to go into... this is now we're going from an X-ray machine - Veza is going to be a platform for onboarding employees, and that platform better be robust."

Timestamp: [20:21-21:37]

• Early customer partnerships can evolve into strategic, long-term relationships when built on responsive product development
• Product-market fit recognition should trigger immediate go-to-market scaling rather than gradual expansion
• Identity market fragmentation creates platform consolidation opportunities for comprehensive solutions
• Customer expansion often requires replacement of existing solutions rather than additive capabilities
• Strategic decisions in startups benefit from thorough co-founder deliberation despite time pressures
• Platform approaches become essential for strategic vendor positioning in enterprise markets
• Emerging identity categories (non-human, agentic) represent significant future expansion opportunities
• Excellence in one capability area creates more customer value than mediocrity across multiple areas

Timestamp: [18:04-21:45]

Companies:

• Intuit - Veza's largest paying customer who drove identity governance development
• Blackstone - Early strategic customer acknowledged for guidance
• Duo - MFA solution representing market fragmentation
• Okta - Single sign-on solution in fragmented identity market
• CyberArk - PAM (Privileged Access Management) solution
• CrowdStrike - ITDR (Identity Threat Detection and Response) solution

Product Categories:

• Identity Governance - Strategic expansion area driven by customer demand
• Privileged Access Management (PAM) - One of three expansion pathways
• Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) - Identity security component
• Single Sign-On (SSO) - Authentication consolidation technology
• Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR) - Security monitoring category
• Non-Human Identity - Emerging category for service accounts and systems
• Agentic Identity - Future category for AI-driven autonomous systems

Business Concepts:

• Net Dollar Retention - Expansion revenue metric requiring platform breadth
• Strategic Vendor - Position requiring comprehensive platform capabilities
• X-ray Machine - Tarun's metaphor for visibility-only solutions
• Platform for Onboarding - Comprehensive identity lifecycle management

Timestamp: [18:04-21:45]

Veza's approach to artificial intelligence represents what Tarun characterizes as another "founding moment" in the company's evolution. Rather than treating AI as a separate initiative, the team is integrating it throughout their product experience to enhance user interaction and operational efficiency.

The most visible application involves transforming user queries from structured database language to natural language processing. Instead of requiring users to write complex queries, they can now ask intuitive questions like "What does Eric have access to?" - similar to Google search functionality.

"Inherently we want to go apply AI in our products. For example, rather than somebody's typing a structured query, now you do natural language - 'What does Eric have access to?' - like Google search."

Beyond product features, AI is accelerating development processes through tools like Cursor and Juni, providing leverage in both how they build products and what capabilities they can deliver. This comprehensive integration approach ensures AI enhances rather than replaces core functionality.

Timestamp: [21:45-22:31]

Scaling from a three-person founding team to 200 employees revealed fundamental limitations in founder-led management approaches. Tarun references the Dunbar Number - the cognitive limit of approximately 140-160 stable social relationships - as the critical threshold where traditional startup communication patterns break down.

The crisis manifests across all communication channels: Slack interactions, email protocols, phone call dynamics, and decision-making processes that worked effectively with smaller teams become inadequate for larger organizations. The informal, direct communication style that drives early-stage success becomes a bottleneck for scaled operations.

"You get to a point where the company goes a little bit into crisis - three founders running with 100 engineers - and that breaks. The way you communicate, the way you talk on Slack, the way you do emails, the way you make phone calls, all of that doesn't work."

This realization necessitates what Tarun calls "refounding" - fundamentally restructuring leadership approaches, communication systems, and organizational processes to support larger team dynamics while maintaining startup agility and culture.

Timestamp: [22:45-23:29]

The first critical leadership evolution involves developing patience around hiring timelines and integration processes. In early-stage startups with four people, new hires can achieve productivity quickly due to direct founder involvement and simplified systems. However, at 150+ people, leadership positions require significantly longer onboarding and effectiveness timelines.

This patience extends beyond hiring to encompass the broader reality that organizational change, process implementation, and cultural integration all operate on longer timescales in larger organizations. The urgency that drives startup success must be balanced with realistic expectations about human and organizational development.

"When you hire somebody, it takes time. When you hire somebody when you're four, they can ramp faster, but when you're 150 people, a leader is going to take time and you just need patience."

Timestamp: [23:29-24:00]

The second leadership evolution focuses on hiring methodology for senior positions. Tarun emphasizes the critical importance of identifying "elite leaders" through extensive reference checking and multiple interaction points - potentially six to nine meetings rather than standard interview processes.

The hiring criteria centers on four key attributes: first principles thinking, systems mindset, passionate problem-solving approach, and deep understanding of cybersecurity markets. This last point is particularly crucial, as Tarun learned that cybersecurity requires specialized selling expertise that doesn't transfer from other technology sectors.

"Hire elite leaders, take your time, back channeling reference, not just one meeting, maybe six, nine meetings with leaders... You're looking for what I call first principles, systems mindset, passionate problem solving mindset."

The cybersecurity-specific requirement stems from recognition that successful leaders from companies like Snowflake or DataDog may not translate effectively to security markets, which require understanding of the "special art of selling" in this unique industry vertical.

Timestamp: [24:00-24:46]

The third leadership challenge involves managing personal emotional intensity and communication style as organizational dynamics change. The direct, informal communication approach that works effectively with co-founders and early employees becomes inappropriate and potentially counterproductive with larger leadership teams.

This evolution requires conscious adaptation of communication styles, emotional regulation, and management approaches that accommodate different relationships and organizational hierarchies. The intensity that drives founder success must be channeled differently across various stakeholder groups.

"Just managing your own emotions and your own intensity, if I can use that word... the way you would talk to your co-founders or the way you would talk to the first 10 employees is very different the way you talk to the rest of the leaders."

Timestamp: [24:46-25:05]

Recognizing the need for external guidance, Tarun proactively engaged a leadership coach early in Veza's scaling journey. His first coach provided valuable foundation but eventually retired and relocated to Boulder, necessitating a transition to a second coach who has proven "transformative" in developing his leadership capabilities.

This coaching evolution demonstrates both self-awareness about personal development needs and commitment to continuous improvement as leadership requirements change. The willingness to invest in external coaching support reflects understanding that founder skills don't automatically scale with organizational growth.

"Very early in this journey I had a leadership coach and she was awesome, but she's like 'I'm retiring, I'm leaving for Boulder,' and she helped me find my second leadership coach, and that gentleman has been transformative for me."

The coaching relationship acknowledges that scaling requires not just new systems and processes, but fundamental personal development in leadership approach, emotional intelligence, and communication effectiveness.

Timestamp: [25:05-25:30]

Tarun's leadership philosophy centers on recognizing that business success ultimately depends on relationships with people rather than institutional structures. This understanding extends particularly to investor and board member selection, where personal compatibility and shared values often matter more than purely financial or strategic considerations.

The insight emerges from "very hard lessons" about the importance of finding the right investors and board members - suggesting that early experiences taught him about the long-term impact of these relationship choices on company culture, decision-making, and founder well-being.

"At the end of the day, it's what you're going to work with - some people, not the walls of a firm, but with people. I learned through some very hard lessons how important it is to find the right investors and the right board members."

This people-first approach influences how he evaluates potential partnerships, making relationship quality and personal alignment primary factors in strategic decisions rather than secondary considerations.

Timestamp: [25:30-25:55]

• AI integration should enhance core product functionality rather than creating separate features
• The Dunbar Number creates predictable scaling crises that require systematic "refounding" approaches
• Leadership patience becomes essential as hiring and integration timelines extend with company size
• Elite leader hiring requires extensive reference checking and cybersecurity-specific expertise
• Founder communication styles must evolve dramatically across different organizational stakeholders
• Leadership coaching provides valuable external perspective for scaling personal effectiveness
• Investor and board relationships are fundamentally about people compatibility, not just institutional fit
• Scaling companies require leaders to continuously adapt their personal management approaches

Timestamp: [21:45-25:55]

AI Tools:

• Cursor - AI-powered development tool mentioned for code writing
• Juni - AI development tool used by Veza team

Leadership Concepts:

• Dunbar Number - Cognitive limit of ~140-160 stable relationships affecting organizational scaling
• Refounding - Process of restructuring leadership approaches for larger organizations
• First Principles - Core leadership attribute for elite hiring
• Systems Mindset - Essential thinking approach for leadership roles

Companies:

• Snowflake - Example of company whose leaders don't transfer well to cybersecurity
• DataDog - Another example of non-transferable leadership experience
• Boulder - Location where first leadership coach relocated

Leadership Development:

• Leadership Coach - External guidance for scaling personal effectiveness
• Back Channeling - Extensive reference checking process for elite hires
• Elite Leaders - Target profile for senior hiring with specific cybersecurity expertise

Timestamp: [21:45-25:55]

The scale of Veza's market opportunity became a catalyst for personal transformation. A mentor's guidance crystallized this realization: when an opportunity is truly massive, it demands corresponding personal growth and reinvention to match its scope and potential impact.

This insight shifted Tarun's perspective from simply executing on existing capabilities to recognizing that the opportunity required him to "man up for this game" - a fundamental evolution in leadership mindset and personal capacity. The size of the market opportunity justified and necessitated the investment in personal development.

"I remember somebody mentoring me is like 'Look, this opportunity is so massive for you, it's so massive that you should reinvention.' The scale of the opportunity was so exciting that it caused you to reflect on yourself to go 'Maybe I need to... just also need to reinvent, man up for this game.'"

This realization marked a transition from leading a small, remote team in Slovenia to building and guiding a diverse, elite leadership organization across multiple geographies and functions.

Timestamp: [26:01-26:50]

The leadership evolution involves transitioning from managing a small, homogeneous remote team to orchestrating a diverse group of elite leaders. This shift represents not just scale but fundamental changes in management complexity, cultural dynamics, and strategic coordination requirements.

Tarun acknowledges that this transformation is ongoing - at the fifth year, they're building one tier of elite leadership, but by the tenth year, they'll need to develop the next generation of leaders. This perspective demonstrates understanding that leadership development is a continuous, multi-generational process rather than a single achievement.

"I'm not leading a 10, 20, 50 member remote team in Slovenia right... we're leading a diverse group, elite leadership team, and this is just the fifth year - at 10th year we'll have the next elite leaders."

Timestamp: [26:50-27:08]

For aspiring entrepreneurs, Tarun's primary advice centers on maintaining dispassionate focus on market feedback rather than personal attachment to initial ideas. He advocates for deliberate detachment from founder passions and preconceptions about solutions.

The core principle involves recognizing that founders don't possess inherent truth about markets or customer needs. Instead, all validation must come from customer and market interactions. This requires humility and willingness to abandon cherished concepts when evidence contradicts founder assumptions.

"Just stay laser focused on the market, be so dispassionate with your own ideas... Don't get so wound up around your idea that that is the only idea. No, the only truth is with the customer and the market - you don't have the truth. Remind yourself and be humble to realize that."

This market-first approach requires emotional discipline to separate personal investment in ideas from objective assessment of market response and customer behavior.

Timestamp: [27:26-28:00]

Building company culture during the COVID era presented unprecedented challenges that Tarun identifies as a critical learning area. Creating values, virtues, and behaviors through remote-only interactions proved significantly more difficult than anticipated, affecting team cohesion and organizational identity.

The contrast with his Data Domain experience highlights the importance of in-person interaction for culture formation. At Data Domain, weekly in-person gatherings with leadership speeches created shared experiences and cultural touchpoints that proved nearly impossible to replicate in purely virtual environments.

"Building a company in a home, in a Zoom for last four years of her life was hard... It was hard for the culture, the teams coming together, the teams marinating with each other... That was one of the reasons why Data Domain was iconic - we were together, Frank would come every Friday for a lunch meeting and he would give his speech."

The realization emphasizes how physical presence facilitates cultural "marination" - the organic development of shared understanding, relationships, and organizational identity that occurs through informal interactions and shared experiences.

Timestamp: [28:00-28:51]

The third critical insight involves hiring leaders based on "stage fit" rather than purely on credentials or general capability. Elite leaders with impressive resumes may excel in certain company phases while being misaligned for others, making timing and context as important as inherent talent.

This concept recognizes that leadership requirements change dramatically as companies evolve from early-stage to mid-journey to mature organizations. A leader perfect for early-stage chaos and ambiguity may struggle with mid-stage systems and process requirements, while a late-stage leader may be ineffective in early-stage environments requiring scrappy, hands-on execution.

"Hire leaders for stage fit. You can hire an elite leader, elite resume, home runs, but stage fit is very important... For an early stage this person is perfect as a leader, but maybe mid-journey they may not be, or they may be excellent for later stage but definitely not great as an early stage leader."

The framework requires assessing not just whether someone can do the job, but whether they're appropriate for the specific size, scale, and mission requirements of the next 2-3 years. While some leaders can adapt across multiple stages, many are optimized for particular phases of company development.

Timestamp: [29:04-29:45]

The stage-fit concept extends beyond general leadership to specific functional expertise. A systems-oriented leader may excel at building processes for 500 people but lack the experience or mindset needed for 5,000-person organizational complexity.

This granular approach to hiring acknowledges that even within functional areas, the skills and approaches that work at different scales require different experience bases and thinking frameworks. The systems needed for mid-stage companies differ qualitatively from those required for large-scale organizations.

"You may still be a systems person, but you need systems for 500 people, not 5,000 people."

This insight helps founders avoid the common mistake of hiring based on ultimate potential rather than immediate fit, ensuring that leadership capabilities align with current organizational needs while maintaining growth trajectory.

Timestamp: [29:45-29:57]

• Massive market opportunities require personal reinvention and growth to match their scale
• Leadership evolution is a multi-generational process requiring continuous development
• Market truth supersedes founder intuition - maintain dispassionate focus on customer feedback
• Remote-only culture building presents significant challenges requiring deliberate compensation strategies
• Stage-fit hiring is as important as capability - leaders must match current organizational needs
• Physical presence facilitates cultural "marination" that's difficult to replicate virtually
• Systems and processes must scale appropriately - what works for 500 people differs from 5,000
• Humility about founder knowledge prevents attachment to unvalidated assumptions

Timestamp: [26:01-30:02]

People:

• Frank - Data Domain leader who conducted weekly lunch meetings and speeches
• Eric - Podcast host, Accel partner

Companies:

• Data Domain - Example of strong in-person culture with weekly leadership gatherings
• Slovenia - Location of early remote team operations

Leadership Concepts:

• Stage Fit - Hiring principle matching leaders to company development phase
• Elite Leadership - Target profile for senior hiring across company stages
• Reinvention - Personal transformation process required for massive opportunities
• Culture Marination - Organic development of shared understanding through in-person interaction

Funding Information:

• D Round - Recent funding round mentioned
• Hundred and Something Million - Approximate amount of recent funding raise

Business Concepts:

• Market-First Approach - Prioritizing customer feedback over founder assumptions
• Remote Culture Building - Challenge of developing organizational identity virtually
• Multi-Generational Leadership - Continuous development of leadership tiers over time

Timestamp: [26:01-30:02]