Cloud security specialist Wiz rejected a $23 billion takeover offer from Alphabet this summer. Wiz’s CEO now explains why.
Wiz, a startup specializing in cloud security, rejected a $23 billion takeover offer from Alphabet this summer. “This was the right choice,” Wiz co-founder and CEO Assaf Rappaport told Tech Crunch. Rappaport believes cloud security is the future and will extend beyond endpoints or networks. After taking over Mandiant, Google’s parent company wanted to expand its security division and position itself as a security expert.
Right choice
Alphabet, Google’s parent company, paid about $23 billion to acquire Wiz, a cloud security startup. The four-year-old company graciously declined that offer. CEO and co-founder of Wiz tells Tech Crunch why they did this.
“We believe cloud security will increase. “The opportunity to become a $100 billion-plus cloud security company is huge,” Rappaport said. He’s not sure Wiz will be that company. “It’s hard to say no to offers like this, but with our exceptional team, I’m confident I can make this choice,” Rappaport said in an email to Wiz employees at the time, according to TechCrunch.
Additionally, Alphabet would not have been the only company to make a bid for Wiz, although no other bid was as large as that of Google’s parent company. When Google made the offer, Wiz had a private valuation of $12 billion.