# Merlin Ventures

> Merlin Ventures is a VC fund backing Cyber Security and Network Security. See 24 investments, check sizes, portfolio and contact details. Updated Aug 2026.

- Type: VC Fund
- Location: Fairfax, United States
- Total investments: 24
- Last investment: Jul 2026
- Lead investor: 29%
- Last updated: Aug 2026
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/merlinvc
- X (Twitter): https://twitter.com/merlin_cyber
- Website: http://www.merlin.vc

Merlin Ventures is a venture capital firm that invests in cybersecurity companies. The firm provides infrastructure for market readiness, cybersecurity engineering expertise, and go-to-market muscle for all of its partners. Merlin Ventures is based in Tysons, Virginia.

## Contacts

5 contacts available for Merlin Ventures. Shizune tracks 3 team members at Merlin Ventures. Sign up free to unlock them: https://app.shizune.co/sign-up/investor-profiles/find-team-emails/merlin-ventures?utm_source=investor_profile

## Round sizes

| Stage | Round size |
| --- | --- |
| Seed | $5.1M–$17M |
| Series A | $12M–$75M |
| Series B | $11M–$60M |

## Investment focus

### Industry

| Industry | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Cyber Security | 12 | 50% |
| Network Security | 8 | 33% |
| Cloud Security | 6 | 25% |
| Computer | 5 | 21% |
| Software | 5 | 21% |

18 industries tracked in total.

### Stage

| Stage | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Series A | 10 | 42% |
| Seed | 9 | 38% |
| Series B | 3 | 13% |
| Series D | 1 | 4% |

### Country

| Country | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Israel | 9 | 38% |
| United States | 9 | 38% |

## Team

| Name | Title | Investments | Profile |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Seth Spergel | Managing Partner & Co-Founder | 3 | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/seth-spergel |
| Shay Michel | Managing Partner | 11 | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/shay-michel |
| Andrew Smeaton | Chief Information Security Officer-in-Residence | 0 | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/andrew-smeaton-50d2 |

## Investments

| Company | Description | Amount | Stage | Date | Website |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Neo Security | Neo Security is a cybersecurity company that develops an AI security platform for enterprises adopting agentic AI and AI-enabled software. The company helps organizations discover, assess, and secure AI-powered applications by providing visibility into how AI systems access data, make decisions, and interact with enterprise environments. Itsplatform is designed to address emerging security risks created by the rapid integration of AI capabilities into existing business software.The platform provides AI application discovery, AI asset inventory, security posture management, access governance, policy enforcement, risk assessment, and continuous monitoring for AI-enabled applications and autonomous agents. Neo enables security teams to identify AI-powered software across the enterprise, understand its permissions and underlying models, evaluate data access and usage, and implement controls to reduce security and compliance risks associated with agentic AI. | $75M | Series A | Jul 20, 2026 |  |
| QIZ Security | QIZ Managing the new obstacles in cryptography and getting ready to switch to post-quantum cryptography | $17M | Seed | Jul 09, 2026 |  |
| Above Security | Above Security provides cybersecurity services focused on threat detection, risk management, and compliance support for organizations. Its offerings include managed security services, vulnerability assessments, penetration testing, and incident response to help identify and address security risks. The company also delivers security operationscenter capabilities that monitor and analyze network activity to detect potential threats. In addition, it supports governance, risk, and compliance programs by helping organizations align with regulatory requirements and security frameworks. Its services are designed to assist businesses in maintaining visibility over their systems and improving overall security posture. | $50M | Series A | Mar 23, 2026 |  |
| Native | Native Security is a cloud security control plane for enterprises. It translates security outcomes into native cloud controls, simulates deployment impacts, and maintains alignment as environments change. The platform enforces security at the architectural level across multi-cloud setups. | $31M | Series A | Mar 17, 2026 |  |
| Jazz | Jazz. And we think that more rhythm—rather than more rules—is the answer. We are developing a DLP that can distinguish between a cat picture and a catastrophe, understand context, and speak human. | $43M | Series A | Mar 10, 2026 |  |
| Torq | Torq is a no-code automation platform for security and operations teams. With Torq, frontline security professionals can easily create automated flows that help them respond to threats faster, remediate risks automatically, and deliver better security to their teams. Torq liberates security teams from the manual burden of managing threat detectionand remediation on a large scale. It ensures seamless communication and collaboration among all systems, enabling them to work together harmoniously. | $140M | Series D | Jan 11, 2026 |  |
| Fabrix Security | Fabrix Security builds AI Agents designed specifically for identity security. With identities multiplying across SaaS, cloud, and on-prem environments, Fabrix equips IAM teams with the intelligence to make confident, explainable access decisions – right at the moment of decision. By infusing AI into identity security, Fabrix closes today’s biggestgap: visibility and intelligence. It enhances existing IAM workflows with speed, consistency, and accuracy, cutting through the chaos of manual, context-less decision-making. From user access reviews and access requests to full identity lifecycle management, Fabrix delivers intelligent, scalable, and proactive identity security. | $8M | Seed | Sep 11, 2025 |  |
| Huskeys | The New Brain for Web App Security. It's not a WAF; It's a whole new ecosystem. |  | Seed | Jun 23, 2025 |  |
| Clutch Security | Clutch Security provide security teams with comprehensive, clear, and actionable tools for Non-Human Identity security. | $20M | Series A | Jan 29, 2025 |  |
| Native | Native Security is a cloud security control plane for enterprises. It translates security outcomes into native cloud controls, simulates deployment impacts, and maintains alignment as environments change. The platform enforces security at the architectural level across multi-cloud setups. | $11M | Seed | Jan 01, 2025 |  |

10 of 24 investments shown.

## Co-investors
- [Lightspeed Venture Partners](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/lightspeed-venture-partners) — VC Fund, 6 deals together
- [Ballistic Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/ballistic-ventures) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [Evolution Equity Partners](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/evolution-equity-partners) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [toDay.Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/today-2) — VC Fund, 4 deals together
- [Bessemer Venture Partners](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/bessemer-venture-partners) — VC Fund, 3 deals together
- [Elron Ventures](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/elron-electronic-industries) — VC Fund, 3 deals together

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## FAQ

### What does Merlin Ventures invest in?

Merlin Ventures invests primarily in Cyber Security, Network Security and Cloud Security startups, most often at Series A and Seed stage. Most of the 24 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in Israel. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.

### What is Merlin Ventures's check size?

Merlin Ventures typically joins rounds of $5.1M–$17M at Seed, $12M–$75M at Series A and $11M–$60M at Series B. These ranges are 10th–90th percentile round sizes calculated from confirmed public funding rounds, so they are a realistic guide to the rounds Merlin Ventures participates in.

### How do I contact Merlin Ventures?

Public channels for Merlin Ventures include LinkedIn, X (Twitter) and the website linked on this profile. For a verified work email and phone number, create a free Shizune account — contact data is searched across 20+ sources and validated before delivery, so your outreach lands in the right inbox.

### Who are the partners at Merlin Ventures?

The team at Merlin Ventures includes Seth Spergel (Managing Partner & Co-Founder), Shay Michel (Managing Partner) and Andrew Smeaton (Chief Information Security Officer-in-Residence). The Team section lists each member with their title, investment count and links.

### Is Shizune's investor data accurate?

Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Aug 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.

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