Policy Intelligence: Reveals Cyber Technology’s Hidden Markets
By Dr. Amit Elazari, Skytop Contributor/ September 29, 2023
Dr. Amit Elazari is the Co-Founder and CEO of OpenPolicy, the world’s first tech-enabled policy intelligence and engagement platform, aiming to democratize access to the future market insights driven by policy and lobbying entities of all sizes. She teaches at the University of California, Berkeley School of Information Master in Information and Cybersecurity, & RUNI, and serves as a member of the External Advisory Committee for the UC Berkeley Center of Long Term Cybersecurity. Amit is also a public speaker, and often keynotes or speaks at global conferences such as RSA Security, BlackHat, CES, and SXSW. Prior to OpenPolicy, she was Head of Global Cybersecurity Policy at Intel Corporation, responsible for shaping and executing Intel’s global security policy and government affairs engagement across all of Intel technologies. In 2023 she chaired the Cybersecurity Policy Committee for the Information Technology Industry Council and the Linux Open Source Security Foundation public policy committee. Amit holds a Doctoral Degree in the Law (J.S.D.) from UC Berkeley School of Law, the world’s leading law institution for technology law, and graduated summa cum laude three prior degrees in law and business. She is the first Israeli LL.M. graduate to be admitted to the doctoral program at Berkeley or any other top U.S. doctoral program in law, on a direct-track basis. She has an extensive background in technical, policy and legal roles, and practiced Hi-tech, Venture Capital and M&A law in one of Israel’s largest law firms GKH-Law. Her research in tech law and policy has appeared in leading technology law and computer science journals, presented at conferences such as RSA and USENIX Security, and featured at leading news sites such as The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and the New York Times. You can find her publications on Google Scholar.
Real-World Problem
I want to share with you a real-world problem statement that many successful entrepreneurs share with me. I have the privilege of working with some of the most amazing cyber startup companies in the world. These are the companies that drive future market solutions to protect our nation, our infrastructure, our networks and our data. These are Unicorns, often founded by the best technical talent, former Israeli military elite computer intelligence from Unit 8200. These startups have access to the world’s leading talent, investors, design partners and technologies.
Market Fit
What they often struggle with is finding the right “market fit”, and defining the product that is missing in the environment. This product will address the top pain point or organizational needs for cybersecurity, and stand out from the competition. What’s striking is these are often pain points that are driven by future regulations and standards – particularly in cyber, AI and privacy. According to leading market intelligence firms, compliance is the factor in purchase decision-making.
Policy Intelligence
In a world where future regulation drives technology markets at scale, and only a selected few lobby and engage with governments – policy intelligence is emerging as the key to unlocking future markets. Entrepreneurs, organizations and investors cannot afford to ignore the future of their market, and policies and regulations are defining their future TAM (Total Addressable Market) and market fit, but we are still missing the tool to fill that gap.
Better Strategic Decision-Making
Today, policy intelligence is hard to distill and comprehend. In an ocean of non-curated sources of information, and limited access to a selected few policy professionals, investors and executives are struggling to identify the key policy insights that matter. But these future market insights are extremely relevant for fast-growing startups and large enterprises and investment firms alike. Policy intelligence can enable these entities to drive better strategic decision-making capabilities for products, roadmap, GTM (Go-To-Market)strategies and even investment decisions.
Influencing Future Market Demand
Government policies are shaping technology markets and influencing future market demand. Sectors like cybersecurity, privacy, and AI domains are especially influenced by regulatory requirements, with compliance being the main factor in customer decision-making. Just recently we have seen the impact of AI policy regulations and standards, from an anticipated Executive Order in the U.S. on AI, to the NIST AI Risk Management Framework to the European AI Act. Innovative entities are trying to anticipate how regulations will drive or limit markets for AI solutions.
Manage, Anticipate, Design
Understanding the future trajectory of government regulations and standards is key for organizations and investors to effectively manage risks, anticipate market demand, design products and generally, Go-To-Market. “Big Tech” companies leverage their in-house policy experts, lobbyists, and trade associations to actively influence lawmakers and shape regulatory frameworks, aligned with their interests.
A Disadvantage
However, many other companies, startups, and VC firms lack the necessary resources and expertise to navigate this constantly evolving and complex landscape, or the needed intelligence to make critical business decisions, putting them at a disadvantage. This dynamic leaves these players without effective solutions to comprehend and capitalize on market and technology risks and opportunities. It also leaves investors lacking proper due diligence methods, and governments lacking valuable policy feedback, as they lack means to effectively engage with innovators.
Ability to Leverage
In the absence of automation, scarce human expertise is relied upon for prioritization, advisement and engagement, resulting in inefficiencies and outdated regulations that fail to capture technology and industry input, negatively impacting society. One of the most exciting opportunities AI brings is the ability to leverage generative AI to better connect between innovative entities and policy makers, and make sense of a wealth of information. In cybersecurity and national security, regulators and policy makers must take action to better understand the technical limitations and opportunities as they consider the introduction of more controls and requirements. The U.S. also needs to consider the “competitive” nature of regulatory markets, where innovative markets can be curtailed from stringed requirements, and more innovators seek other nations to develop their products from, enjoying a more liberated regulatory market.
The Right Balance
Striking the right balance on innovation and regulation, with an evolving need to drive organizational controls and attack surface that is changing, will require a much tighter connection between industry and governments, and between policymaking and technology’s limitation. But with generative AI, we can leverage technology to enable smarter, more effective, scaled, and open access to policy, unlocking valuable market intelligence and decision paths to entities of all sizes.