By: Morgan Kyauk, Managing Director & Alec Kiang, Senior Associate
At NightDragon, we’ve long believed that the future of cybersecurity lies in operationalizing expertise by transforming the intuition and know-how of elite defenders into scalable, adaptive technologies. That’s why we are excited to announce our investment in Horizon3.ai.
The Early Insight: Expertise Alone Doesn’t Scale
Years ago, during our time building FireEye and Mandiant, we saw firsthand the power of world-class red teams and actionable threat intelligence. We learned that the ability to think like an attacker and use that mindset to validate defenses in real-world conditions was one of the most powerful tools in a defender’s arsenal.
But scaling that capability was hard.
Back then, the tech simply wasn’t ready, and the talent shortage that plagued the cybersecurity industry was already widening. Operationalizing that expertise required heavy services, custom scripting, endless playbooks, and a web of brittle integrations. It was powerful, but not scalable. Expensive, slow, and difficult to deploy in the hands of most organizations.
A New Paradigm: From Static Layers to Autonomous Motion
Fast-forward to today, and the cybersecurity landscape has evolved … but the threat landscape has evolved faster.
Attack surfaces are dynamic, adversaries are AI-enhanced, and controls are often outdated the moment they’re deployed. The traditional model of “defense in depth” — stacking static layers and hoping they hold — no longer suffices.
What’s needed is a more proactive posture to cybersecurity. Gartner calls it Adversarial Exposure Validation, which is a step in the right direction. But we need to move to “defense in motion”: a model where security continuously tests itself, learns from each simulation, and adapts defenses in real time. To use a hockey term, “skating to where the puck is going”. Not just to known threats, but to emerging techniques, evolving environments, and adversaries who are already inside.
At NightDragon, we call it Autonomous Security. That’s exactly what Horizon3.ai delivers.
NightDragon’s Autonomous Security Framework:
Why Horizon3.ai
Horizon3.ai’s NodeZero® platform is a fully autonomous adversary emulation engine that helps organizations test and update their defenses in real-time. It doesn’t just scan for vulnerabilities — it acts like an attacker, chaining together real exploits across your internal, cloud, and external environments. It validates risk with the precision of a red team, but at the scale of a cloud-native platform. And it works without expensive services, without disruption, and without requiring a SOC army to operate. Whether you’re a Fortune 500 enterprise or a mid-market IT team, NodeZero gives you the power to see your environment through the eyes of the adversary, and fix what matters most.
More importantly, Horizon3.ai is led by a team rooted in deep red team and special operations experience and uniquely suited to understand how to solve such a critical problem. Snehal Antani, CEO and co-founder of Horizon3.ai, brings a rare combination of deep technical expertise, strategic vision, and operational leadership to Horizon3.ai. His background spans both Silicon Valley innovation and national security-grade mission execution, making him uniquely qualified to lead a company at the intersection of offense-informed defense and AI-driven automation. The founding team includes former operators from U.S. Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) and the intelligence community, bringing firsthand experience with the tools, tactics, and mindset of today’s most advanced adversaries.
Our Perspective at NightDragon
The Horizon3.ai team has captured a shift we’ve been watching for years – a move from episodic validation to continuous exposure management. From playbooks and consultants to autonomous, adaptive platforms. From “defense in depth” to “defense in motion”.
That’s why we’re proud to lead this investment and join forces with Horizon3.ai. We believe they are not just building a product, they are defining a category.
Cybersecurity doesn’t need more dashboards. It needs platforms that can think, act, and evolve like attackers so defenders can finally stay ahead.
Welcome to the age of Autonomous Security – where the defender finally gets to move first.