In this holiday episode special, we’re joined by Hamza Fodderwala, Executive Director at Morgan Stanley, where he leads cybersecurity equity coverage. He joined Morgan Stanley's software research team in early 2016 and leads coverage for public cybersecurity companies like Palo Alto Networks, CrowdStrike, Fortinet, SentinelOne, Okta, Zscaler, Cloudflare, Rapid7, Check Point, Qualys, Varonis and Tenable. Before Morgan Stanley, Hamza was an equity research associate at Susquehanna International Group covering the financial technology sector. Hamza graduated from New York University, with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics.

We dive into Hamza’s insights on the major customer buying patterns in cybersecurity throughout 2024 and what might shift in 2025. Hamza shares his observations on how the Generative AI boom is influencing product adoption in the industry, and whether enterprises are currently adopting AI security solutions. Additionally, we explore key trends from cybersecurity resellers, discuss what might unlock public equity markets for new IPOs, and which private cyber companies could go public next.

Our discussion covers the cybersecurity M&A landscape, highlighting over $50B in deal volume this year with companies like Juniper, Darktrace, Recorded Future, Synopsys, Venafi, and more all getting acquired. Finally, Hamza shares lessons for founders, offering advice on identifying areas ripe for disruption, navigating the venture funding landscape, and building resilience in a competitive industry.