Pressure’s on for Service Providers in the Age of AI-Powered Cyber Threats
If you’re running a managed security service provider (MSSP) or managed detection and response (MDR) business, you already know the pressure. Clients are demanding more, threats are getting smarter, and finding (and keeping) skilled analysts has never been harder. You’re expected to deliver better results, faster, all while managing costs and growing your business.
That’s no easy feat.
Today’s threat landscape is defined by speed, scale, and sophistication — much of it driven by adversarial AI. Attackers are automating what used to take hours, exploiting blind spots with lightning speed. At the same time, your clients expect fast incident resolution and consistent, accurate results. It’s a tough combination. And in this environment, you’re not just offering protection — you also need to continuously show the value of your service.
We built our MSSP program, and our product, to help you do exactly that.
Why Traditional SOC Models Fall Short
SecOps teams have always faced the classic challenge: how to be both effective and efficient. But as client expectations rise and threats evolve, that balance has become even more critical — and harder to maintain.
Hiring more people to address the problem doesn’t scale— it raises costs and often creates diminishing returns. It becomes a vicious cycle: stretch your team too thin, and coverage suffers. Add more resources, and your margins shrink. That’s not a sustainable path — especially when you’re trying to grow.
We hear this from service providers every day: “We need to do more, with less — and we need to prove it works.” As Randy Watkins, CTO of Critical Start says:
“With Conifers it’s possible to maintain comprehensive detection coverage while conducting deep, high-quality investigations, ensuring faster and more accurate responses to incidents.”
The New MSSP Reality: Faster, Smarter, Streamlined
That’s where AI-driven security operations centers (SOCs) come in. MSSPs and MDRs can leverage advanced AI techniques as a preemptive strike to help predict and preempt attacks. And AI-powered SOCs will enable providers to optimize their SecOps by reducing false positives and improving incident response times, as well as gain actionable insights and recommendations that strengthen their overall security posture.
What if you could transform your SOC so that it becomes more effective as it scales — without requiring a proportional increase in cost or headcount?
That’s the idea behind our Conifers CognitiveSOC™. We designed it specifically for the needs of MSSPs and MDRs, who must tackle multi-tier incidents (from Tier 1 to Tier 3) with precision and speed, without sacrificing client-specific context or flexibility.
Smart Multi-Tenancy: Scale Contracts, Not Costs
Your clients all have different needs and requirements so why should your SOC be one-size-fits-all? True scalability starts with infrastructure that’s built for the MSSP model. Conifers leverages institutional knowledge—risk tolerance, analyst behavior, historical data — for each of your tenants so their results are more accurate and finely tuned. Centralized tenant management and nested-multi-tenancy capabilities with seamless integration to any tech stack facilitates expansion. According to Rutger de Boer, CTO of DTX
“The Conifers platform’s ability to manage dozens of tenants, each with its own baseline and customer-specific knowledge base, has significantly improved the quality of our operations, reducing investigation times in a way that’s both efficient and effective.” (Read the full DTX case study here.)
Keeping Humans in the Loop — Where It Matters Most
We’re not replacing your analysts. We’re helping them be more efficient so they can focus on more complex tasks.
AI for SOC platforms like CognitiveSOC are designed to shadow your teams, learn from their behaviors, and improve with every incident. Think of it as a force multiplier — one that reduces noise, surfaces high-risk threats faster, and gives your team more time to focus on what they do best.
When incidents do need escalation, our platform ensures teams have all the context they need across all tiers — 1, 2, and 3 — to resolve incidents, including a timeline of attacker behavior, relevant enrichment, and correlation with known tactics. No more starting from scratch.
Our goal is to help your analysts work smarter, not harder. And it’s working: our customers are reducing end-to-end investigation times by up to 87%, enabling providers to scale and expand their businesses.
“Conifers is transforming how we run our SOC. Instead of drowning in alerts or hiring more analysts, we now have agentic AI that acts with context, scales our expertise, and adapts in real time. It’s more than what automation provides—it’s intelligence we can trust. With Conifers, we’re delivering faster, smarter, and more precise security outcomes for every customer.”
– Edmund How, Founder & CEO, ONESECURE
Prove Your Value, Every Day
You can’t prove value if you can’t measure it. Clients want to see the results of your work — not just that alerts were reviewed, but that risk was reduced. They want to know their investment is making a difference. And let’s be honest: if you can’t show that, renewals get harder.
That’s why CognitiveSOC gives you the tools to tell a better story. From strategic dashboards to detailed performance metrics, you can show how your services are directly improving detection effectiveness, reducing response times, and minimizing business risk.
And because every client has different KPIs, we built flexibility into the system. Whether it’s compliance reporting, ROI justification, or internal SOC metrics, you get the data you need to win trust and grow relationships.
Crawl, Walk, Run: A Realistic Path to AI Adoption
We get it — the idea of “AI transformation” can feel overwhelming. But going all-in from day one isn’t the only path. In fact, it usually isn’t the best one.
Many of the MSSPs we work with start in stages. They test AI capabilities against specific use cases — like impossible travel detections or suspicious lateral movement — and expand as they see results. This gradual rollout builds confidence internally, limits disruption, and delivers quick wins that drive adoption.
You can integrate Conifers into your current stack without ripping and replacing anything. Our platform fits in seamlessly—we’ve prioritized compatibility because we know you’ve already made big investments — and we want to help you get more value from them. And the last thing you want your team to spend time on is learning how to use a new tool outside of their existing processes.
MSSP-Friendly, Predictable Pricing
It’s not just about technology. You need a partner who understands the MSSP business model — the operational realities, the competitive pressures, and the need for predictable margins.
That’s why we offer transparent, scalable pricing tailored for service providers. Whether you’re onboarding your fifth customer or your fiftieth, you can plan ahead and avoid unpleasant surprises.
Why MSSPs Choose Conifers
We’re not just solving low-level alert fatigue — we’re helping MSSPs handle everything from Tier 1 triage to Tier 3 response. It’s a full-spectrum solution designed for teams like yours.
When you partner with Conifers, here’s what you unlock:
- Higher margins, thanks to increased efficiencies and predictable pricing
- Improved client satisfaction and increased retention backed by KPI-driven reporting and insight
- Multi-tier incident support from the simplest to the most complex threats
- Faster response times, with contextual investigations powered by tenant-specific knowledge
- Greater efficiency by leveraging the right combination of AI techniques for each incident analysis for accurate resolution
- Scalable multi-tenancy, making it easy to grow without duplicating effort
- Seamless integration with your existing tools, from SIEM to ticketing
Conifers was also recently listed as a Sample Vendor in a Gartner emerging trends report titled, “Emerging Tech: Emerging MDR Trends to Grow Your Security Service Revenue.” (Gartner subscription needed to access the report.) Topics discussed include the integration of advanced AI for managed detection and response, and use of AI for prioritization and enhanced effectiveness.
Ready to Scale Smarter?
If you’re looking for a way to scale your managed SOC business profitably and show your clients exactly how you’re reducing risk — without burning out your team or slashing your margins — let’s talk. Or you can request a live demo of Conifers CognitiveSOC.
Dallas, TX — April 25, 2025 — Conifers.ai, the agentic AI platform designed to transform security operations, today announced the appointment of three new board members, Chairman Art Coviello of SYN Ventures, David Johnson of TLG Holding and Ryan Permeh of SYN Ventures. These industry veterans bring decades of experience in business strategy, M&A and technology leadership to their positions as advisors for the already fast-growing cybersecurity startup.
This announcement follows the company’s recent $25 million funding round led by SYN Ventures and Picus Capital. Since emerging from stealth in January of this year, Conifers has experienced rapid success, more than doubling its headcount to meet growing demand. Additionally, it has expanded its headquarters in Dallas, TX, and is actively hiring for a variety of roles.
“The increasing need for both greater quality and efficiency in security operations, as well as delivering measurable, strategic results, underscores the importance of providing advanced SOC security solutions that directly address our customers’ pain points,” said Tom Findling, Co-founder and CEO of Conifers. “We’re seeing significant demand for our unique approach, which is transforming security operations for both the enterprise and security service providers through advanced AI, disruptive pricing, and a staged implementation model. The extensive expertise these new advisors offer will be invaluable to our growth and long-term success.”
New board members include:
Managing Partner & IC Chairman for Flagship Funds, SYN Ventures
Art Coviello has been a central figure within the information security industry for more than 25 years. Most notably, Coviello served as President and CEO of RSA and following RSA’s acquisition by EMC (for $2.1B) as an Executive Vice President of EMC and head of its Security Division. Since stepping down from RSA in 2015 Coviello has been an active investor and advisor in the technology industry, guiding many startups as a private investor and currently as a Managing Partner of SYN Ventures.
Senior Partner/Member of Investment Committee, TLG Holding
David Johnson is a globally recognized corporate strategist and expert in M&A and related integration, having successfully completed more than 120 acquisitions representing more than $40B of equity investment, divestitures, and venture capital investments. Johnson co-founded TLG Capital Partners, after having joined the Blackstone Group where he was a Senior Advisor and Senior Managing Director. While at Blackstone, Johnson led the firm’s technology sector where he was responsible for numerous domestic and international acquisitions in Cyber Security, Cloud Solutions, IT Services, Consulting and Outsourcing.
Operating Partner at SYN Ventures
Ryan Permeh was previously the Co-Founder and Chief Scientist of Cylance, acquired by Blackberry for $1.4b in 2020. He led the architecture behind Cylance’s mathematical engine and groundbreaking approach to security. Permeh has been in the security industry for over 20 years and has a long history in both offensive and defensive security. Prior to co-founding Cylance, he served as Chief Scientist for McAfee, focused on technology strategy, and as a Distinguished Engineer at eEye Digital Security, focused on building security assessment tools.
“Conifers’ approach to leveraging AI in cybersecurity is innovative, solving complex challenges SecOps teams face as a result of escalating threats, and directly addressing pain points in the industry while increasing value for the customer,” said Coviello. “As their growth accelerates, I look forward to contributing to their strategic vision and business objectives to help make them successful in the market as they scale.”
To learn more about the Conifers platform and its leadership team, visit the website.
About Conifers.ai
Conifers.ai is transforming security operations centers (SOCs) with its AI-native Conifers CognitiveSOC™ platform, enabling enterprises and managed security service providers (MSSPs) to achieve SOC excellence. By leveraging agentic AI, Conifers empowers security teams to investigate complex, multi-tier incidents at scale with confidence, efficiency, and accuracy. Led by seasoned industry veterans and supported by SYN Ventures, Conifers is committed to addressing critical SecOps challenges through innovative solutions that enhance operational effectiveness, advanced investigation reasoning, and decision-making capabilities. With its unique staged implementation framework and patent-pending architecture, Conifers.ai builds trust in AI adoption, delivering measurable ROI and business impact. Learn more at https://www.conifers.ai or on LinkedIn and X.
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Geena Pickering
Look Left Marketing
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The story of Conifers, which we brought out of stealth today, is one rooted in resilience, purpose, and a commitment to solving some of the hardest challenges in cybersecurity. Our journey began years ago, not in a boardroom or a startup incubator but in the intelligence units of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), where I was first exposed to the transformative power of technology and data science. I had the unique opportunity to work on cutting-edge technologies in the intelligence domain. We were pioneers in leveraging data science to extract insights from massive datasets—transforming raw information into actionable intelligence in real-time. This experience revealed to me the true potential of data science when applied to complex, high-stakes problems, a lesson that would resonate throughout my career.
From Data Science to Cybersecurity
My career then took me to VMware, where I led product teams focused on solving large-scale business challenges using data science. Whether it was operational optimization or performance improvement, I saw firsthand how data science could uncover patterns, enable better decision-making, and scale complex solutions for global enterprises.
Later, I joined a sustainability-focused startup, where we leveraged data science to optimize power generation and consumption to streamline production on the factory floors of power plants. It was here that I gained a deeper appreciation for how data, when effectively analyzed and applied, could improve efficiency and solve operational bottlenecks—directly driving measurable outcomes.
However, my most transformative shift came when I re-entered the world of cybersecurity. At Rapid7 (via an acquisition of IntSights, where I was Chief Customer Officer), I led initiatives that integrated data science into the detection and response practice. My work focused on improving how organizations detected and responded to threats by automating processes and uncovering patterns that human analysts might overlook. These experiences reinforced for me how critical data science is for advancing cybersecurity solutions and revealed significant gaps in the industry’s ability to harness this potential.
The Birth of Conifers
Through these varied experiences, it became clear to me that the power of data science was underutilized in cybersecurity. I had seen firsthand the challenges faced by Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) and MDR providers: issues with quality, scalability, expertise shortages, labor inefficiencies, and outdated technology. On the enterprise side, I observed security teams struggling with visibility, risk management, and proactive detection and response.
Conifers was born from a desire to address these challenges. Our mission is to help organizations—whether service providers or enterprises—adopt cutting-edge solutions powered by data science to drive real, actionable outcomes. By combining advanced data science and AI with deep cybersecurity and SecOps expertise, Conifers aims to redefine the way organizations approach cybersecurity.
Tackling the Hard Problems
At Conifers, we focus on solving the most pressing challenges in the Security Operations Center (SOC)—not just incremental improvements, but transformative solutions. One of the biggest issues SOCs face is the lack of expertise needed to investigate alerts thoroughly and efficiently. Even highly skilled analysts are often overwhelmed, leading to compromises that leave organizations vulnerable.
Data science plays a pivotal role here. It allows us to automate the detection, triage, and investigation of alerts in ways that are not just faster but also more accurate. By creating multi-tiered contextual investigations, we’re ensuring that alerts are handled with the depth and precision needed to prevent breaches as soon as possible to the point of compromise.
But this isn’t about automating repetitive tasks—it’s about building systems that fundamentally change how SOCs operate, by delivering measurable results and ROI. Our solutions help organizations reduce risk, gain better visibility, and achieve a level of SOC excellence that was previously unattainable.
Building the Right Team
A key part of our journey has been assembling a team that shares the same vision and values. My co-founder Alon and I have known each other since we were two years old, growing up together in Tel Aviv. We’ve worked together on multiple projects, and our shared experiences have built a strong foundation of trust and collaboration.
Our third co-founder, Mark, joined us through a mutual connection. His technical expertise and belief in our vision made him the perfect fit for our team. Together, we worked tirelessly to refine our ideas and secure funding, driven by a shared commitment to solving real problems for our customers.
The Values Behind the Name
The name “Conifers” was inspired by a trip to Colorado, where I was struck by the resilience of the evergreen trees that thrive in the harshest conditions. These trees survive extreme heat, fires, snow, and freezing cold—a symbol of the resilience and adaptability we aim to build into our company.
For us, Conifers represents not just a name but a set of values. It’s about building a company that can endure challenges, adapt to changing landscapes, and continue to grow, just like the trees that inspired us.
A Commitment to Solving Real SecOps Pain
At Conifers, we’re not interested in building tools that offer marginal improvements. Our focus is on delivering real solutions to real problems. The SOC is one of the most challenging areas in cybersecurity. And we see many other options out there that were born from the desire to create an AI-based solution for the SOC. But the result of this approach can align with the adage, “When you’re a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” Instead, we started with the problems SecOps was trying to solve, and then determined the best mix of data science and AI techniques that would deliver effectiveness and efficiency. We’re committed to not only addressing the basic day-to-day struggles that security teams face, but also the harder questions that CISOs and the C-suite need to answer such as “Have we reduced our overall risk?”, “How efficient is my SOC—how are we getting better?”, “What is the level of accuracy in our investigations?”
Our approach centers on leveraging data science and AI to improve the quality, efficiency, and outcomes of SOC operations. By applying these techniques at scale, we’re helping organizations solve critical SOC challenges at scale, increasing effectiveness and efficiency, reducing risk, and increasing proactiveness to achieve SOC excellence. This isn’t just about adopting AI for the sake of it—it’s about delivering tangible results that matter to our enterprise and service provider customers. And we also understand the desire to “implement AI” but the lack of trust and confidence because of the unknown. We have made it possible for organizations to build that trust and confidence by letting them roll out our platform and “verify and trust” and their own pace.
Why We Chose the Hard Path
Many cybersecurity companies focus on low-hanging fruit—small, incremental changes that are easier to achieve. At Conifers, we chose the harder path. We’re tackling the big, complex challenges that have traditionally been considered “the hard nuts to crack.”
This decision was driven by a desire to truly move the needle. Whether it’s automating contextual investigations, reducing alert fatigue, or improving SOC detection and response workflows, our CognitiveSOC™ platform has been designed from the start to deliver significant, measurable, strategic results. We believe that by focusing on the hard problems, we can have a meaningful impact on the organizations we serve.
Looking Ahead
As Conifers continues to grow, our mission remains the same: to build a company that solves hard problems, delivers real value, and helps organizations achieve their cybersecurity goals. We believe in the power of AI—not as a buzzword, but as a transformative tool for driving meaningful change.
Conifers is more than just a company; it’s a reflection of our journey, our values, and our commitment to making a difference in the world of cybersecurity. We’re excited about what the future holds and look forward to continuing to push the boundaries of what’s possible.
