Ryft, a data infrastructure startup, has emerged from stealth mode with US$8 million in seed funding.

The funding round was led by Index Ventures and included participation from Bessemer Venture Partners, as well as executives from Zscaler, Crowdstrike, Confluent, and Cisco.

Founded in 2024 by Israeli intelligence veterans, Ryft builds on Apache Iceberg to offer secure, compliant data management without cloud vendor lock-in.

Its platform adds a managed layer to Iceberg, helping businesses cut cloud costs and gain more control over their infrastructure.

Ryft already serves clients in finance, ecommerce, adtech, gaming, and cybersecurity sectors.

The funding will support team expansion, partnership growth, and improved commercial capabilities.

🔗 Source: Calcalist

🧠 Food for thought

1️⃣ The shift toward vendor-neutral data architectures is gaining momentum

Ryft’s approach aligns with a significant industry trend: organizations are increasingly seeking to avoid vendor lock-in while maintaining the benefits of managed services.

This parallels the broader industry adoption of hybrid multi-cloud environments, which Secureframe predicts will accelerate as organizations prioritize flexibility and cost-effectiveness in their data infrastructure 1.

The emphasis on Apache Iceberg as an open-source foundation reflects the trend toward data mesh architectures that promote decentralized data ownership across business domains 2.

This strategy addresses a pain point identified in performance comparisons between major platforms like Snowflake and Databricks, where vendor-specific optimizations can lead to significant cost and performance differences—in one test, Snowflake was 58% faster and 28% cheaper for specific workloads 3.

LSEG’s implementation of over 800 managed service instances globally demonstrates the robust demand for solutions that balance control with convenience, particularly in data-intensive sectors 4.

2️⃣ Security and compliance capabilities are becoming critical differentiators

Ryft’s founding team’s intelligence background could prove significant as security and compliance emerge as top priorities in data management solutions.