Lightowler brings proven leadership experience at Palo Alto Networks and Imperva to accelerate Veza’s global expansion in identity security
Veza, the leader in identity security, has announced the appointment of Kane Lightowler as president and chief operating officer (COO). Bringing extensive experience in cybersecurity and scaling high-growth companies, Lightowler will lead global go-to-market strategy encompassing sales, marketing, customer success, and alliances. In the past year, Veza has tripled its growth, and Lightowler’s expertise will help amplify continued global momentum.
“The identity security landscape is rapidly evolving with the rise of cloud, AI, and the explosion of non-human identities—challenges legacy solutions struggle to meet”
“Kane is an accomplished leader with a history of successfully scaling high-growth cybersecurity companies,” said Tarun Thakur, co-founder and CEO of Veza. “In just four years, Veza has made a lasting impact on the identity industry by proving that permissions and entitlements are the essence of identity. As we aim to build the next-generation identity platform, Kane’s leadership and go-to-market expertise will be instrumental in accelerating our growth and expanding our global footprint.”
Lightowler joins Veza with more than 20 years of experience leading go-to-market teams in cybersecurity. Most recently, Kane served as vice president of worldwide go-to-market (GTM) for Prisma Cloud and Cortex at Palo Alto Networks. Previously, he was chief revenue officer (CRO) at Expanse (acquired by Palo Alto Networks) and held leadership roles at Carbon Black, where he led enterprise sales GTM for the Americas through its IPO and acquisition by VMWare. Lightowler also served as area vice president at Imperva for Asia Pacific and Japan and as regional sales director for Australia and New Zealand. His extensive background showcases a track record of scaling high-growth companies.
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“Throughout my career, I’ve championed next-gen solutions as essential for building effective cybersecurity strategies,” said Lightowler. “Veza provides unmatched visibility into access permissions, helping security teams clearly understand who can do what with their data. This simplifies identity and access management, mitigates risk, and empowers organizations to unlock the full potential of their data. I’m thrilled to join a team driving such transformative change in cybersecurity.”
Lightowler joins the Veza team at a time of rapid growth as more organizations, such as Sallie Mae and Snowflake, recognize the critical importance of identity-first security in today’s complex digital landscape.
Recent company highlights also include:
- Triple-digit year-over-year ARR growth, among the top quartile of start-up performance1.
- More than 120% enterprise net revenue retention (NRR), which represents top level performance according to Iconiq Capital.2
- Monitoring 2.2 billion permissions (1000% increase from 200 million permissions in June 2023) and 10+ million identities.
- Multiple industry awards including, CRN 2024 Top Stellar Startups, Fortune Cyber 60, and more.
- Multiple customers across Fortune 500 and Global 2000 organizations with customer acquisition across financial services, healthcare, pharma, life sciences, retail, and big-tech.
“The identity security landscape is rapidly evolving with the rise of cloud, AI, and the explosion of non-human identities—challenges legacy solutions struggle to meet,” said Karim Faris, general partner at Google Ventures (GV). “Veza’s rapid growth underscores its innovative approach to identity security. We’re thrilled to welcome Kane to the team; his proven expertise in scaling cybersecurity companies makes him the ideal leader to propel Veza’s next phase of global expansion.”
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