Brian Laing

Current

Founder at Anzen Networks
Founder at HiveMedia.TV

Past

Founder / Chief Security Officer at RedSeal Systems
Founder & CEO at Blade Software
Product Management at Internet Security Systems (ISS)

VP of Networking and Security Services at BATS
Director of Security and Special Projects at Applied Materials

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Recommended

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Connections

500+ connections

Industry

Computer Games

Brian Laing’s Summary

Seasoned entrepreneur with 15+ years of business vision and technical leadership, contributed in various executive level roles in IT security and product development. A strategic thinker with a strong entrepreneurial spirit, and a proven ability to turn product visions into business results. Most recently cofounded RedSeal Systems ($31M in funding), and conceived the overall design / features of the product. Prior to co-founding RedSeal Systems founder and CEO of self-funded Blade Software, who released the industry’s first commercial IPS/FW testing tool. Grew the company from inception to $1M in sales in just two years with only four people in the company. Prior to funding Blade Software I was a leader in product management at ISS; increasing revenue for the desktop sensor over 100% in 1.5 years, and pioneering techniques in IDS/IPS deployment documented in my fundamental and widely circulated paper “How to Implement a Network IDS”

Brian Laing’s Specialties:

Technical visionary with the unique ability to tailor that vision to the business needs of the company.

Corporate Strategy, Design and Tactical Execution

Skill to see the “Big Picture” and all its probable corollaries

Product management & product marketing leadership and vision from concept through development (SaaS, Enterprise Software, Services, etc.)

Enterprise Security Software Market Vision and Analysis

Complex problem solving

Investment Preparation

Brian Laing’s Experience

Founder

Anzen Networks

(Computer & Network Security industry)

October 2008 — Present (1 year 3 months)

Despite heavy investments in multiple security technologies businesses of all sizes struggle to meet today’s complex set of operational and regulatory compliance requirements. The amount of manual work needed to manage this fragmented set of data makes it impossible for companies to effectively manage the process, or gain a continuous view of their compliance status. At Anzen we are building a Security as a Service offering to meet these needs.
Founder

HiveMedia.TV

(Media Production industry)

October 2008 — Present (1 year 3 months)

Stealth Internet media company.
Founder / Chief Security Officer

RedSeal Systems

(Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Computer Software industry)

May 2002 — October 2008 (6 years 6 months)

While working with several VC to syndicate a deal with Leapfrog ventures, I decided to merge with a company that was building an application-focused version of Blade Software’s security and compliance solution. We emerged as RedSeal in 2004, a well-funded start up. As the CSO my focus is on product direction & design, business development and overall company direction.

Customers
End Users (Cisco, Stanford Hospital, Autodesk, Mckesson, Barclays, The Weather Channel, Thompson Financial)

Consultants (KPMG, Protiviti, Accuvant)

Notable Accomplishments:

Fundraising: $14.5M Series A & $17.5M Series B, from Leapfrog Ventures, Venrock, Sutterhill Ventures, and JAFCO

Conception and design of key features: Adaptive Risk Algorithms, Threat Reference Library, data visualization, usability, and risk metrics.

Being referenced with several pages in Network Security Assessment: From Vulnerability to Patch

Ongoing support on technical due diligence for some of our VC
Founder & CEO

Blade Software

(Computer Software industry)

May 2002 — October 2004 (2 years 6 months)

I founded & bootstrapped Blade Software, a security products company that delivered the industries first commercial IDS & FIREWALL testing tools. As the CEO I was able to generate over $1M in sales with just four total people in the company and no VC funding. With limited personnel I filled many roles on the technical side (product design, QA, attack development, etc.) and business side (business development, sales, managing cash flow, etc.).

Customers
Vendors (Cisco, ISS, Intrusion, etc.)

End users (US Airforce, Reuters, Goldman Sachs, etc.)

Consultants (EDS, Wipro, ATT, etc.).

Noteworthy accomplishments
Getting the Informer product line covered and reviewed favorably in trade magazines.

Being referenced with several pages in Snort Intrusion 2.0 and Snort Intrusion 2.1.

Starting the security device testing market, which is now being serviced by multiple VC-backed companies.
Product Management

Internet Security Systems (ISS)

(Public Company; ISSX; Facilities Services industry)

July 1998 — June 2002 (4 years )

While at ISS I focused on getting consulting and training services running in the US and the UK. Once this was done, I joined a small team responsible for a majority of ISS product revenue. I covered the management consoles, desktop sensors and the core packet engine.

Noteworthy accomplishments
Customers included LIFFE, Lucasfilm, Deutsche Bank, ARAMCO, ING Barings, European Bank of Reconstruction, British Telecom and British Petroleum.

Growing revenue for the desktop sensor by over 100% in 1.5 years

Successfully defending the networks for several London financial companies during a 48 hour anti capitalism cyber attack.

Security for www.starwars.com for The Phantom Menace release

Getting a Saudi Arabian visa with less than 24-hours notice so I could arrive to defend a network under attack.

Taking a leadership role on the Siteprotector 1.0 design

Various security whitepapers, including the pioneering whitepaper on IDS/IPS deployment
VP of Networking and Security Services

BATS

(Computer & Network Security industry)

August 1993 — November 1996 (3 years 4 months)

In 1996, I joined a small Unix-focused consulting company. I was recruited from Applied Materials to join BATS to build their Windows & Network Security groups. Within six months I had grown my team to 16 consultants. I was able to maintain over 90%+ utilization through strategic structuring of my service offerings.

Noteworthy accomplishments
Clients included McAfee, Sega, Sony and others.

Working on Mcafee Mall, the first online ecommerce site

Building an ISP for Arthur C. Clarke in Sri Lanka

Building a web-enabled distributed vulnerability scanner using the ISS scanner and the commodity-scanning engine. I delivered this to customers in 1997, a service that was not replicated until Qualys did 2 years later.
Director of Security and Special Projects

Applied Materials

(Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; AMAT; Semiconductors industry)

January 1994 — May 1996 (2 years 5 months)

In 1994, I joined Applied Materials as one of two initial technical staff to be brought in to rebuild the IT infrastructure. When I first arrived most of the network was dumb terminals and mux ports. In the first year I worked on a small team that designed and deployed a world-wide NT domain, including deploying a fully switched environment and desktop machines to the entire corporation. To speed up this deployment and the deployment of the many custom applications that Applied Materials required I created two tools. The first tool was a system-imaging tool similar to, but pre-dating Symantec’s Ghost. I also expanded on a rapid application deployment system (RADS) that allowed me to deploy 8000 SAP clients with a team of just three people.