Episode 51: From London to Silicon Valley: AI Security for the Enterprise with Harmonic's Alastair Paterson

Dec 29, 2025

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DESCRIPTION:
Join Den Jones as he sits down with fellow Brit Alastair Paterson, CEO and co-founder of Harmonic Security, to explore the challenges of AI adoption in enterprise environments. From bootstrapping a cybersecurity startup in London to scaling in Silicon Valley, Alastair shares insights on securing AI workflows, the cultural differences between UK and US startup ecosystems, and why traditional DLP solutions fall short in the AI era.

GUEST INFORMATION:

Name: Alastair Paterson
Title/Credentials: CEO and Co-founder of Harmonic Security
Background: Former CEO and co-founder of Digital Shadows (acquired in 2022), cybersecurity entrepreneur who moved from London to San Francisco to scale his companies [3:03]
Connect with guest: Based in San Francisco, actively hiring across 20 open positions [31:25]

EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS:

Introduction to Harmonic Security
Harmonic enables secure AI adoption for enterprises, sitting between business teams wanting to leverage AI and security teams managing risk [1:43]
Key quote: "Huge amount of tension between the business that's wanting to push forward and lean into this wave in a big way. And then the security legal and compliance teams are trying to hold the tie back a little bit" [1:59]
The Evolution of Harmonic's Mission
Originally focused on data protection using language models, evolved to address broader AI governance challenges [5:32]
Key quote: "We can start to use language models for data protection too... with the context and understanding around what users are doing and the intent behind the data" [5:17]
Why Traditional DLP Fails
Traditional DLP solutions are inadequate for modern data protection needs [7:00]
Key quote: "DLP has always sucked. It's been really just a money pit of uselessness" [7:00]
Harmonic's Deployment Approach
Browser-agnostic extension that provides visibility into 6,000+ AI applications without disrupting user experience [10:52]
Key quote: "The end users experience no change at all on day one at all. But the security team gets visibility now at prompt level and at intent level" [11:07]
Lessons from UK to US Expansion
UK founders take too long to enter the US market, hampered by medium-sized domestic market [16:19]
Key quote: "If you're losing in the US because you got here too late, you're going to lose the category. You've got to win the US, you've got to get here fast" [16:39]
Cultural Differences in Startup Ambition
UK culture less supportive of startup ambition compared to Bay Area's grand planning mentality [18:05] [20:39]
Key quote: "In the UK, if you've got a grand plan, people will tell you to pipe down a bit and know your place a bit more" [20:39]
Talent Market Dynamics
Bay Area offers world-class go-to-market talent but at double the cost of London for technical roles [26:59]
Key quote: "It's just half the cost in London that it is in the Bay Area for top tier engineers" [27:42]
The Four Pillars of AI Security
Threats from AI (deepfakes, phishing), AI for security (SOC automation), protecting AI applications, and workforce AI adoption [33:27] [34:12]
Key quote: "I think there's only really four problems and one of them we want to own with Harmonic" [33:27]