Large cybersecurity incumbents are not fully embracing an AGI-centric strategy for forensics. Their focus on existing product revenue, combined with a cultural skepticism among security professionals about AI's true capabilities, means they are undervaluing the paradigm shift. This inertia provides a crucial opening for 'AGI-pilled' startups.
The primary threat from AI disruptors isn't immediate customer churn. Instead, incumbents get "maimed"—they keep their existing customer base but lose new deals and expansion revenue to AI-native tools, causing growth to stagnate over time.
The best investment returns in cybersecurity will come from startups tackling security for emerging technologies. New attack surfaces, such as those from Agentic AI, represent a 'blue sky problem' where a startup can build a category-defining company without facing incumbents.
Unlike cloud or mobile, which incumbents initially ignored, AI adoption is consensus. Startups can't rely on incumbents being slow. The new 'white space' for disruption exists in niche markets large companies still deem too small to enter.
Asymmetric Security operates on the assumption that AGI is inevitable. This 'AGI-pilled' worldview shapes their strategy to completely rethink cyber defense, preparing for a world with a virtually unlimited supply of intelligent labor, rather than just automating current tasks.
The current cyber defense model is reactive, using triage for endless alerts. Asymmetric Security's AGI-premised strategy is to shift this paradigm to proactive, continuous digital forensics. AI agents provide the 'infinite intelligent labor' needed to conduct deep investigations constantly, not just after a breach is suspected.
A major market opportunity exists when one side of an industry (e.g., insurance companies) adopts new technology like AI faster than its counterpart (e.g., hospitals). Startups can succeed by building tools that close this technology gap, effectively 'arming the rebels' and leveling the playing field.
The skills for digital forensics (detecting intrusions) are distinct from offensive hacking (creating intrusions). This separation means that focusing AI development on forensics offers a rare opportunity to 'differentially accelerate' defensive capabilities. We can build powerful defensive tools without proportionally improving offensive ones, creating a strategic advantage for cybersecurity.
Security's focus shifted from physical (bodyguards) to digital (cybersecurity) with the internet. As AI agents become primary economic actors, security must undergo a similar fundamental reinvention. The core business value may be the same (like Blockbuster vs. Netflix), but the security architecture must be rebuilt from first principles.
Product managers at large AI labs are incentivized to ship safe, incremental features rather than risky, opinionated products. This structural aversion to risk creates a permanent market opportunity for startups to build bold, niche applications that incumbents are organizationally unable to pursue.
Many engineers at large companies are cynical about AI's hype, hindering internal product development. This forces enterprises to seek external startups that can deliver functional AI solutions, creating an unprecedented opportunity for new ventures to win large customers.