Ilan Yeshua has spent most of his professional life as a salaried CEO. He led companies like Encyclopedia Brittanica Israel and the Walla! website and even led the deal by which Yad2 was sold to German publisher Axel Springer for NIS 800 million. But only at the age of 64 did he become an entrepreneur for the first time.
Together with cybersecurity expert Avihay Cohen, he founded Seraphic Security. On Tuesday the sought after exit was sealed when the startup was sold to Crowdstrike for an estimated $420 million.
Yeshua founded the company in the midst of his testimony for the prosecution in the Netanyahu corruption trial in the Bezeq-Walla affair (Case 4000). While appearing in court, he simultaneously managed to raise millions of dollars for the startup. His associates describe a man who "was battered by the affair and reinvented himself." Now, at the age of 69, he is becoming a senior executive at US cybersecurity giant Crowdstrike, which is traded at a market cap of about $118 billion and produces annual revenue of about $4 billion.
Cofounder Avihay Cohen is considered a brilliant cybersecurity researcher who worked as an independent consultant for penetration testing in enterprises. The connection with Yeshua was formed when Cohen provided these services to the Walla website, where he presented it with a critical security breach that he had identified in many organizations: the browser. The use of browsers such as Chrome and Edge by employees to access sensitive corporate applications (such as Salesforce and Outlook) has made the browser one of the main weak points in organizations.
On founding the company, the two divided the powers: Cohen leads the technological side and manages dozens of developers who are graduates of elite cyber units, while Yeshua is in charge of business development, building teams, recruiting investors, and creating strategic partnerships.
The one who handles everything
Although Yeshua is a veteran and well-known figure in the local arena, Seraphic has hardly raised capital from Israel, with the exception of biomed entrepreneur Motti Beyar. However, the connection to Israel has been maintained through the first investor and largest shareholder in the company - the Swiss fund Planven, in which Israeli Eran Westman is managing partner.
According to PitchBook, Planven led the company's seed round, which raised $500,000 at a valuation of just $4.5 million. The fund, which specializes in investments in European and Israeli technology, chose Yeshua and Cohen's venture after reviewing several companies in the field of browser security.
"Yeshua is one of the sharpest CEOs in the industry," says an insider. "Although he doesn't come from the world of cybersecurity and doesn't fit the classic profile of an entrepreneur in the field, he brings with him a wealth of international experience. Proof of his ability was the sale of Yad2 to Axel Springer - a deal he led for the Bezeq-Walla group, which ended with a four-fold increase in the original purchase price."
Another senior industry official stresses the uniqueness of the connection between the founders: "In startups that emerge from military units, the entrepreneurs usually have technological training and share out the roles between them - who will be CEO, who will be VP technology, and who will be product manager. With Cohen and Yeshua, the division was clear from day one. Yeshua is the CEO ,who ‘handles everything’ - the man who builds the organization from the inside and creates the strategic partnerships outside."
The gamble paid off
Yeshua and Cohen's bet on browser security was re-affirmed at the end of 2023, when Palo Alto Networks acquired Israeli company Talon for $600 million. Together with Island, Talon marked the growing trend of secure enterprise browsers. However, Seraphic offered an intermediate approach that won the market sympathy: unlike its rivals, it did not require the organization to replace the existing browser, but integrated itself as a security layer within familiar browsers such as Chrome and Edge.
The momentum in the field allowed Seraphic to raise an additional $29 million (at a valuation of $64 million), in a round led by the US fund GreatPoint Ventures (GPV). GPV's choice was not accidental: the fund has close ties with cybersecurity giant Crowdstrike, which itself made an investment and formed a strategic partnership with the company.
Crowdstrike saw how its major rival Palo Alto was strengthening in corporate network protection and browser security technologies, and sought its own solution. Later, the communications giant Akamai also joined the partnership. Talks to turn the partnership into an acquisition have been ongoing for the past few months, until Crowdstrike CEO George Kurtz officially announced the deal on Tuesday.
The $420 million acquisition price, which was revealed by "Forbes" magazine, represents a 6.5x premium for Seraphic over the company's valuation just a year ago. The biggest beneficiaries of the deal are Planven and GreatPoint, along with the two Israeli founders - Yeshua and Cohen. Although the two do not control the company, they are expected to pocket, according to estimates, $50-100 million each. The entrepreneurs will share the exit proceeds with the company's employees and the third founder, American Suresh Batchu, who joined Seraphic in 2023.
No response to this report was forthcoming from the company and Ilan Yeshua.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on January 15, 2026.
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